


Chasing Echoes

by dark_pulse



Series: Tyranny Of The Sun [1]
Category: Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: F/F, F/M, M/M, Mage!Stiles, brotherhood!braeden, dawnguard!allison, it's a goddamn modern skyrim au idk what to say anymore, sterek big bang 2k16
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-26
Updated: 2016-10-26
Packaged: 2018-08-27 01:50:02
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 12
Words: 46,443
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8383213
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dark_pulse/pseuds/dark_pulse
Summary: "And Caine himself would be struck down for his defiance. Impaled on a spike of cold blue, in the Kingdom of the Blackest Reaches. And he would enact the very Masquerade itself, tying his murderous childe to the darkness. His blood would drip, becoming the geodes and the rubies and the sapphires that men would crave. His body, a curse that would taint the very energy that claimed him. And when the root that contained the energies of Nirn would turn crimson, the sons of Akatosh himself must take up the bow and blessed arrow, lest the tyranny of the sun comes to an end."





	1. The night is still young (and so are we)

**Author's Note:**

> What would have made sense here would have been strictly sticking with White Wolf's tabletop versions of mages and wolves and such, but I didn't. I took their hunters and werewolves and applied it to Skyrim's mechanics and modernized it behind the veil of the Masquerade. I'll outline the various ideas that will be presented within the story itself, but some chapters will begin or end with a little index on terms used and I'll slowly be adding information presented on my tumblr at some point.
> 
> Enjoy!

“Thanks,” Stiles mumbled, lip curling up at Scott's offering of a skeever from his maw.

 

He was just happy it wasn't shredded to pieces from Scott's enthusiasm.

 

Scott looked pleased, sitting back on his hind legs and looking to the moon. It was hanging low and full in the sky, watching over the werewolves that prowled beneath it. Things were peaceful for once _,_ a rarity in Beacon Hills.

 

“Get out of here, it's only ten.” Lydia chided playfully, smiling when Scott gave her a faux wounded snuffle that Lydia had stopped falling for years ago. “We could use more deathbell, if you feel like helping out.”

 

Stiles doubted he would, but Scott seemed to be in agreement and raced off back into the forest, back where the rest of their pack ran free. He pulled a face before tossing the dead skeever into the blazing bonfire.

 

It was the first full moon that they were all present and accounted for, without anything or anyone tugging their haphazard pack apart. And it seemed like a good night for a full moon run – the wolves had shifted into their _lupus_ forms the moment that darkness began to tug on the horizon. They sprinted off, the wind snapping at their heels, leaving their humans to set up their usual camp.

 

Lydia kicked off her shoes almost immediately. The cooler she was dragging behind her came to rest by a fallen log, while Stiles, Braeden, Kira and Allison shuffled around their campsite. Allison popped open her lounge chair, kicked off her boots and socks and reclined. Stiles cracked open a beer and flicked his wrist, letting the spark of a flame roll of his fingertips with practiced ease. Kira lowered herself next to Lydia, hands already flying at her hair to tie it up in a long, slick ponytail.

 

They sat, peaceful and comfortable, slowly spreading and curling next to each other as the wolves of their pack raced in and out of sight. Occasionally they dropped little things they had gathered during their running; creep clusters, glowing mushrooms and the colorful mountain flowers that painted the fields of the province.

 

A howl was heard, breaking the human members of the pack out of their reverie. Lydia snatched up her bag, pulling a black notebook from it.

 

“Stiles,” Lydia started, and Stiles melted further into the bean bag he had dragged up to the clearing. “You wouldn't mind a quick chat about the store's sales tonight, would you?”

 

“I haven't had any trouble with sales, though?” Stiles tried, eyes still closed from his earlier doze. “In fact, if you check the numbers for last week-”

 

“You've exceeded my predictions, yes.” Lydia tutted. “I just want to know who your source is.”

 

“I told you, he’d really rather not be known. He told me he gets his stuff from sucking Molag Bal's dick, so I stopped asking. Would you keep asking after that? If you're sucking a Daedric Prince's dick, I'm sure finding ice wraiths are a walk in the park.”

 

A perfectly manicured brow arched before Lydia simply shook her head, her pen scratching over a line on her personal notebook for keeping.

 

“In either case, there will be a shipment on Monday. Profits are a fair bit ahead of what I initially predicted they would reach this month, that's because of your _friend_.” Lydia stressed the word, eyes slicing narrow at Stiles as he lifted his third beer in a mocking toast.

 

Wolf's Bane was the the name of the apothecary that Braeden opened four years ago, but it was a quiet thing. Only a certain breed of customer knew that Wolf's Bane existed, much less requested their services-- after all, to Beacon Hills, Wolf's Bane was actually a comic book shop by the name of Arcane Comics. It ran a decent cover for the true nature of the shop, as well as providing a helpful amount of side income.

 

It was the 6th Era, and magic had become openly scorned and rejected to the point of non-belief. The supernatural creatures and Mer that once quietly roamed the Earth along side humanity fell to the wayside. The planet evolved, unaware of entirely different world, behind the curtain of consistent ignorance and false tales. In time, elves walked among the men once more, their illusion spells undetectable to the average human, mages clutched satchels of taproot and nirnroot that looked like nothing more than herbs to an untrained eye, and werewolves were no more than stories told when the season was right.

 

Perhaps it was for the best. Magic was easier when the world was newer, when having the sharpness of an elf in your cheekbones wasn't a cause to be scorned _,_ before humanity repeated the mistakes of the Dwemer before them. Still, even with the eventual erasure and dismissal of the unfamiliar, Dwemer ruins were still scattered across the planet, terrifying and daunting and destructive to anyone who managed to step inside.

 

It was there the curtain parted and magic flowed like the streams that carved paths through Beacon Hills.

 

“Dumbass.” Lydia replied, already checking out from Stiles' half of the conversation. “Braeden, your side of the store is doing as well as I thought it would. Potion sales _are_ up, though. If we keep that up, if you can both keep creating and acquiring high quality product, we should be able to purchase the last bit of territory for the pack, unless--”

 

“Unless?” Kira asked, her chin hooked over Allison's shoulder, arms around her waist, fingers combing through Braeden's coiled hair. The three of them made quite the pile of tangled limbs, all long legs covered in denim, their feet bare.

 

“Unless we sell our acquired land and expand Wolf's Bane. With the right stock, we could double profits for the pack.”

 

Silence descended upon the clearing.

 

And it wasn't as though Lydia was wrong, she wasn't. She rarely was. They would earn far more money towards pack projects if they sold their land and use the funds for another shop.

 

Stiles cracked his eyes open as the silence bordered on uncomfortable, and he _hated it_. It wasn't an untouchable subject, because they had discussed it many times as a pack since the last time the Hales were seen in Beacon Hills almost six years ago. And they all agreed beyond a shadow of a doubt that acquiring the land legally would be a fair showing of respect. It was what was right.

 

Their pack wasn't falling apart by any means. Even with Stiles’ studies in the north taking up a lot of his time in the past few years, the pack had never shown any interest in moving, individually or as a pack, but that was because they had no established _leader_. No one was really willing to step in and truly lead them. They protected Beacon Hills just fine, and had started building up a few positive treaties, but there was always that malingering thought: nothing was keeping them here. Nothing really held them together.

 

The unspoken question flared back to life between the five humans, one that had been dashed and dodged as Scott continued to reject a leadership position.

 

“Stiles, Derek's not--”

 

It was in that moment that Scott came bounding back over, his excitement at running with his whole pack giving him reason to shift into his _hispo_ form. Scott seemed to vibrate energy and cheer, padding back and forth in front of the bonfire. For a moment Stiles wondered if Scott had heard their conversation and came over to help lighten things up a little.

 

Perhaps he did. A werewolf's _hispo_ form looked much like their usual wolf form, _lupus_ , but _hispo_ was approximately the size of a pony. It was large and imposing, but Scott's usual cheerful grin in wolf form was still charming as he nuzzled the side of Kira's face, rumbling low in his chest. Kira, taking this as the invitation that it was, untangled herself from Braeden and Allison and climbed on Scott's back.

 

Silence took the clearing again as Scott sped off, but Stiles didn't let it linger this time. “No. We're not selling.”

 

Lydia sucked in a sharp breath, as though she was going to argue her point, but let it out in almost the same second. She grabbed her drink, swallowing down what Stiles knew to be a rum and coke.

 

“Sales are steady at the comic book shop, as always,” Lydia went on. “Your idea to bring in more merch worked out fine, and the trade costs aren't too bad. Everything is progressing smoothly. But Stiles,” and Lydia was saying it to _him,_ because he was taking on a bit of a mantle that he didn't really want either. It was balanced and working, but it wouldn't work, eventually. Not in the long haul. Not for what being a pack in this day and age meant.

 

“I know you don't want to sell. I get that. But we're all here now. We have to find some way to keep us above water.”

 

“Isn't that what we're doing?” Stiles responded immediately. “Making this work? I didn't go to Winterhold to run away, or because I wasn't committed.”

 

Lydia went tight lipped at that, snapping her notebook shut. “That's not what I meant, and you know it.”

 

“Probably,” and that was Stiles' dismissive voice, a voice that he seemed to have developed thoroughly while at the Mage's College, but _something_ had happened to him while he was up there. He was colder, but his spark and brightness still shone through whatever weird initiation process the Elves had him go through.

 

He looked a little different as well. When they were in high school, and even before, he used to hide the little things about him that made him stick out. Lydia wondered when he stopped doing that, stopped casting illusion spells to hide the amber of his eyes, the long arch of his ears.

 

Acceptance was a good look on him.

 

Stiles reached forward from his bean bag to grab the bottle of black rum that Lydia had used in her coke, and swigged from the bottle.

 

“But also, consider this. If Scott switched into big wolfy form, that means the others probably will be as well.” He took another healthy swig, cheeks puffed out as he swallowed it down. Lydia winced. “If I have to get on one of their backs, I'm going to need to be drunk to do it.”

 

He held out the bottle to Lydia, who shook her head, a hint of a smile stretching on her lips. Stiles shrugged in response, and let it go.

 

Tonight was far too nice of a night to ignore.


	2. cause i've been thinkin' bout forever

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> derek how do u fuck up so thoroughly? like it's never half way it's always 100% a clusterfuck congratz

Stiles' mornings generally went like so: He would wake up to music. It would be Braeden's, because no one else in the house is willing to wake Stiles up with Rihanna's strained vocals. He'd splash his face with water, run his fingers or a comb through his hair and stumble downstairs where there would be at _least_ four members of his pack shuffling around the kitchen and den.

 

Allison's arms would be around Braeden's waist, making a nuisance of herself as Braeden tried to throw together enough breakfast for whoever happened to be in the house that day. It was always a show, and always something different, but it would _always_ have an excessive amount of meat.

 

Werewolves, because of their fine tuned senses, had personal space issues, especially when it came to pack mates. Stiles would call it a 'go figure' moment, but being part of the pack also meant he would respond to them in kind. Whenever someone was in the sunken den, they were never alone; someone else would be down there with them, arms and legs splayed haphazardly over each other as the morning slowly pulled them all to wakefulness.

 

Comforting.

 

Post full moon, however, was _always_ a clusterfuck, no matter what.  Adding a hangover on top of it was Stiles' mistake, but it wasn't a mistake he was willing to deal with for long.

 

The full moon, which caused any given werewolf to give into their instincts and run free, was a special time for those whose wolves were born or bitten under the full moon. The _Ahroun_ wolves: Born under the light of the full moon, they were known for the fierceness in battle. Their drive to hunt would push even the wolves of the forest to join a werewolf pack in running. Their pack contained two _ahroun_ who were fierce and terrifying in and out of their hispo forms.

 

Last night was the first night in a few months that their whole pack could run freely, and it left them all more exhausted than usual.

 

Before he could crack open his eyes, he heard the familiar beats of some Rihanna song. 'Lemme Get That', Stiles’ mind supplied helpfully, as his stomach rolled violently. Pots and pans were clanking fairly close by, so Stiles wasn't confused when he cracked open his gummy eyes and found himself dogpiled in the den.  

 

Mostly clothed bodies, he noticed, with Lydia to his left, and Scott to his right, holding both him and Kira in what could be called a protective embrace if not for the fact that no one in that room actively needed protection. Next to Lydia laid their pack's two _Ahroun_ wolves, Isaac and Jackson, who were sleeping soundly. They curled around Danny, who wouldn't wake up without some serious prodding.  Blankets were covering legs, some covering backs, and some were crumpled near the short staircase that lead to the kitchen, where Stiles hoped there was already toast.

 

He shifted slightly, careful to run a calming hand over Scott's chest as he got to his feet. (He got a grunt in return and Kira got two arms around her instead. Cute.) Stiles was the third person awake, but also the least likely to bother in the kitchen when hungover, so he simply grabbed a pre-buttered piece of toast that was atop a loaded plate of the same, sitting on one of the kitchen islands like an offering.

 

Braeden's face wasn't sympathetic, but amused as she rounded on Stiles, taking in his bleary, hungover energy, puffy eyes and pale face.

 

“There's stuff for a tonic in my bag, if you can manage it.” Braeden's voice was soft and low, but the fact remained that she didn't care enough about his headaches to a) make the potion for him or b) even consider turning down her morning mood music. Maybe it was all the time at the College that had Stiles turning nocturnal, but he couldn't greet a morning with happiness. Watching Braeden's hips sway from side to side in beat to the music made him yearn for her fortitude with alcohol, because he sure didn't have it.

 

So he munched on his toast while he watched Braeden and Allison work their magic; and _honestly_ , feeding four male werewolves _and_ Stiles wasn't a joke. It was a mission and Braeden took to it well, even comparing herself to Jesus when he fed the thousands with the loaves of bread and fish.

 

Bacon and sausage were being fried, eggs lined up, a full rice cooker was going, veggies were being cut up, cheese was being grated, juice was made and pitchers for water were being filled.

 

Usually, Stiles would at least get up and set the table for everyone, but today it all made his stomach roll with another wave of dehydrated agony. Allison gave him a little smile of sympathy, bringing over a glass of water for him. He gave her a half grin, sucked it down and pulled himself from the island, headed to his and Braeden's workshop in the basement.

 

It was dim, lit by the lowest of lights on the staircase, and if you wanted to actually _see_ down there, you would have to cast a spell – magelight grew between his fingers and was tossed right above the alembic. Stiles rubbed at his eyes and squatted down to check on their powdered reserves of ingredients.

 

He didn't know where Braeden's satchel was. He didn't care. He didn't want to throw ingredients into the food processor, he simply wanted – blue mountain flowers, rock warbler eggs and wheat, _haha!–_ preprocessed powder that he could dump in a vat and mainline into his body to stop it from revolting. This wasn't the fourth era, he didn't have the patience to grind up his ingredients.

 

As he waited for the vat of spring water to heat up, he measured out the powder and left it on the counter, eyes squinted in the light of his spell. He sat on the stool that he sometimes used for studying texts and looked over the store related notes.

 

Slips for incoming merchandise, requests, personalized orders, notes from the Guild, _money_ from the Guild, the skeever he had tossed into the fire last night that needed to be skinned, and--

 

**_Stiles- read this when you wake up_ **

 

Allison's handwriting was neat and tidy, he thought blandly, opening up the hastily written note.

 

_You conked out earlier than any of us expected, and after we all got home, Scott brought us some strange samples of nirnroot. Check it out when you get the chance, because we haven't found any info about it._

 

The spring water had warmed to a rolling boil, and Stiles dumped the powdered ingredients into the vat and turned an egg timer as he looked for the nirnroot in question. It was behind the counter, still wet, but Stiles could easily see why Allison had requested he take a look at it.

 

The leaves were blood red. The exact shade of blood, actually, and he had seen more than enough in his life to pinpoint that. But that was the only difference he could see. It was still shaped exactly like nirnroot, it still continued to radiate with energy from the Earth in his hand. But the leaves and roots were red,with fibrous veins running through the red leaves.

 

He'd never seen anything like it.

 

It was just a shame his hungover mind didn't have the willpower to even bother processing it past “this is weird.”

 

Lunch was a lively time when Stiles was finished nursing his headache in the basement. He came back to everyone around the excessively large dining room table, music still playing, keeping the mood light and cheery as their pack attacked the loaded _platters_ of food that Braeden had prepared. A space was left in between Braeden and Scott for Stiles to sit and he plopped himself down, rubbing a hand over his face.

 

“So, what'd you think?” Allison asked as Stiles started loading up his plate. “Of the nirnroot.”

 

“It smells weird,” Scott added, in between swallowing. “Like congealed blood.”

 

“I'm eating,” Jackson complained, bacon hanging out of his mouth.

 

“Oh, please. I saw you last night with that skeever.”

 

Jackson looked prim, and Stiles rolled his eyes. None of them really had any foothold in the _I'm so disgusted and squeamish about blood_ argument.

 

“Nothing I've ever seen or read about while I was at the College,” said Stiles, cracking an egg over his steaming bowl of rice. “A quick search didn't do anything either, so--”

 

“Are you going back to the college?” Kira asked, frowning.

 

“What? No, not right now.”

 

It was a strained topic, and while Stiles wished everyone would just let it go, he knew why it was strained. He cleared his throat slightly, as though he was going to say something, but decided against it, and shoveled his lunch into his mouth instead.

 

“Not that this isn't awkward as all get out, because it is,” Jackson said after a few minutes of quiet eating. “But not everyone here actually cares.”

 

“Make the point in one sentence.” Braeden murmured, still focused on her meal. Scott snorted.

 

“I'm going to work, and Stiles better not have run off to friggin' Winterhold when I get back.”

 

“Absolutely no promises.” Stiles snarked in return, getting an eyeroll for his efforts.

 

Lunch went on normally from there. The pack resumed their happy chatting as Jackson got up and got ready to go, with Kira and Isaac trailing behind him. Kira pecked Stiles' cheek and Scott's lips, Jackson gripped Stiles' shoulder with affection and Isaac scuffed his hair.

 

Stiles didn't know why they thought he could simply leave this behind.

  


It was evening when Nickolas showed up, sucking on candy as always. It was a lollipop this time, and Stiles smiled in response to Nickolas' little wave. His slightly wavy brown hair was stuffed under a slouchy knit cap today, and it would look sloppy if not for his neatly trimmed mustache and goatee set that Stiles was in jealousy fueled awe over.

 

Nickolas was Stiles' source, as it were. Stiles had just opened his half of Wolf's Bane – ingredients, natural cures and consultations– when Nickolas strolled through the door, a bag of salts in his hand. Stiles was _floored_.

 

A trade was struck. Stiles' proficiency in conjuration made collecting filled soul gems a simple process, Nick could never really get the hang of alchemy, and Stiles remembers sleeping through a lot of his enchanting classes. Soul gems for ingredients and occasionally a listening ear to bitch at.

 

It worked.

 

“What'd ya get for me this time?” Stiles chirped, getting to his feet and dusting cheeto dust off his fingers and onto his pants.

 

“Oh dude, I've got a bunch-- the fire salts you asked for, for a start. A coupla briar hearts, spriggan sap, a jar of dwarven oil _and_ chaurus eggs, and let me tell you, chauruses are right _cunts._ ”

 

Stiles burst out laughing, taking one of the eggs in hand to admire the blue color. “I imagine. I've only seen one, never had to deal with them.”

 

“Lucky. The list you gave me was a little easy, I thought you were going to ask for something actually hard to get.”

 

“What? I asked for daedra hearts on there.”

 

“Yeah, I only had time to get two. You usually powder them, right?”

 

Stiles actually tended to make extracts of them, but he nodded as Nickolas pulled two daedra hearts from his sling backpack, both in sandwich bags and bloody.

 

“Akatosh be a _fence_.” Stiles swore, eyes wide as he took the bloodied bags.

 

“I couldn't find any jars, sorry.”

 

“It's cool,” Stiles replied slowly, still turning the hearts over in his hand. Daedra were supernatural entities that were mostly found on the plane of Oblivion, which most mortals couldn’t reach without some magic fueled effort, and even then, slaying a daedra was beyond the grasp of a typical mortal-- even a mage.

 

“I've got the soul gems you wanted.”

 

“Mm, yeah, cool.” Nickolas shifted awkwardly on his feet, back and forth, while Stiles took stock of their new items on his tablet. He glanced at Nickolas' ever semi-awkward self – he didn't want to meet anyone else in the pack, sans Scott, who he had met in passing a few times.

 

“Did you want to hang out in here for a bit, Nick?” Stiles asked, pulling out the jars and packing he used for his ingredients.

 

Nick shot him a grateful smile, and dragged a stool up to the counter, legs swinging as he tapped on the wood.

 

“What's on your mind, pretty boy?” Stiles snorted in response, admiring the red of the daedra heart; it's lush, deep color oddly reminiscent of the crimson nirnroot.

 

Stiles didn't have any reason to be completely honest with Nickolas, but Nickolas himself was often candid about some of the things bothering him, so at times Stiles would humor him with minor pack issues.

 

Nickolas said he was twenty one years old, had briefly attended the College before deciding it wasn't for him, and spent most of his time wandering the world with his family. He didn't really name names, but as far as Stiles knew, he had mentioned an elder sister whose name he’d heard once or twice, and two brothers.

 

Nick's endless alchemic knowledge (theory; in practice he had blown himself up more than he cared to admit) and his knowledge of the College was easy proof that he _knew_ about the supernatural, could easily read Stiles' long ears and crackling aura as elven, but Stiles had no idea who or _what_ Nickolas was. Stiles was leaning towards _what_ with this delivery of daedra hearts.

 

No reason to trust him, but no reason to outright lie either.

 

“You first.” Stiles replied, measuring out portions of spriggan sap to be sold.

 

“My sister is driving me _insane_.”

 

“Oh?”

 

And that opened the floodgates for Nickolas, who went on a long winded ramble about his more “traditional” sister, who was looking to settle down somewhere and had followed him here to Beacon Hills, spying on him. Which, to Nickolas, was whatever. She was going to spy on him, and the best he could do was simply dodge her. However, she had took a liking to Beacon Hills. Nickolas was wary as to why.

 

“She wants to move here,” Nickolas finished, exasperated, and Stiles made a noise of sympathy.

 

“Beacon Hill isn't that bad. Quiet. I'd say it's a great place to raise a family, particularly with my pack here.”

 

“Your pack?”

 

“You met Scott, I'm sure you could tell.”

 

“He's a wolf, yeah, but,” Nickolas looked at him curiously, eyes glittering. Nickolas had brown eyes like Stiles, but unlike Stiles' light, almost golden rimmed eyes, Nickolas' eyes had a preternatural glow to them that he could blink away in an instant. “He's not the Alpha, right?”

 

“Noooope.”

 

“Why?”

 

Stiles looked up, and there, there was that _glow_ that always made Stiles feel hunted. It was a little startling; there was little that truly made Stiles uncomfortable, after years of facing down the worst of what hid in caves and unstable werewolves. The look in Nickolas' eyes, though. It felt off. He didn't think the look was truly directed at him, but it was disconcerting, nonetheless.

 

“Why do you want to know?”

 

Nickolas smiled again, easy and loose, but Stiles stayed on his guard. “My sister,” Genevieve, Stiles' mind filled in, “I'm serious. She wants to settle here, with the rest of the family. It's polite to introduce yourself to the Alpha of a werewolf pack, and that's what she'll want.”

 

Stiles didn't say that they didn't have an alpha, because that would be revealing too much, and it was considered a _weakness._ They managed fine on their own, for a pack of what seemed like mostly humans and beta rank wolves, but they _needed_ an alpha, and while Stiles thought Scott was the most reasonable way to go, Scott disagreed.

 

“Seems kind of weird for a bunch of humans to introduce themselves to an Alpha, don't you think?” Stiles hedged, setting the sandwich bags, still ripe with blood, to the side.

 

“Not at all.”

 

Nickolas seemed sure of himself, and Stiles... _wasn't_. For all the time he had spent around werewolves, there was still a lot he didn't know about them. Oh, sure, he knew a werewolf up close, and had spent the better part of a decade as a part of a ragtag pack, but he didn't know their traditions farther than what he had read, and had experienced in negotiations with other packs. Most assumed he knew what he was doing, even if they felt a little insulted by negotiating with a human.

 

He still found it better than the hard glares from his fellow Merkin.

 

Stiles let Nickolas' statement hang, unwilling to reveal anything else to a stranger. _Friendly,_ sure, but still a stranger. He finished putting his personal items away, and writing down what was for the store before engaging again.

 

“I mean. Scott or Braeden is probably who she'll want to talk to. Our Alpha isn't very friendly.”

 

“They're not?”

 

“No, he's sort of a dick.”

 

“Tell me about him?”

 

Stiles opened his mouth to spin some yarn about a non specific werewolf Alpha that he knew, probably the one in Winterhold who ran the entire fucking province at his old age, when Derek's face sprang to mind and he paused. Derek wasn't their Alpha. Why would he spring to mind?

 

It was then that Scott decided to amble in, his usual blue hoodie hanging off his head with his arms out of the sleeves.

 

“Oh, hey Nick.” Scott greeted, the tip of his nose twitching as he scented the room. “How've you been?”

 

“Scott,” Nickolas acknowledged with a smile. “I'm alright, just harassing Stiles until my sister calls looking for me because apparently, she's actually my mother.”

 

Nick pulled a sour face, and both Stiles and Scott laughed.

 

“I came to give Stiles relief in the form of Kira, actually.” he pointed at Stiles, who was still feeling a little jumpy from the look in Nickolas' eyes. “She's out front, closing up with Danny, and we're going to head out.”

 

“That's my cue,” Nickolas got to his feet, stretching his arms above his head.

 

“And this is your due.” Stiles squatted behind the counter to grab the filled soul gems that Nickolas generally asked for as payment and plopped them up on the counter for Nick to take.

 

“Ha. I'll grab the usual when I'm out. See you later, Stiles. Scott.”

 

Nick saluted them both before dipping out the back door-- Wolf Bane's front door – and melting into the night.

 

Scott rounded on Stiles the second he didn't smell Nickolas in the air anymore, lips curling back in a smirk that made Stiles' eyes narrow in amusement.

 

“Shall we walk?”

 

Stiles agreed, folding up his written records for the night and sliding them into a folder and sticking them behind the counter. Scott spun his keys around his fingers as Stiles packed up, throwing a hoodie on, sliding his tablet into his sling bag, and packing a few sample cases.

 

Scott ran to the front of the store where Kira and Danny were doing their nightly close routine to give Kira a quick kiss, then ran out to follow Stiles, who was flicking through his facebook.

 

“So...” Scott began, starting towards the woods that made up most of Beacon Hills. “You and Nickolas, huh?”

 

“You've gotta be kidding me.”

 

“He was looking at you like you were a sundae and he was craving ice cream. Anton looked at you like that, and we all know how he felt about you.”

 

Stiles' eyes about rolled out of his head, and if he could get them to roll out of his head, he'd have them roll down the street to the pizzeria to get him some fucking pizza and roll back. Instead, he opted to treat Scott to his middle finger. Scott's grin somehow turned more wolfish.

 

“He _freaks_ me out, dude. Like, he's cool, you know? Smart as shit, but maybe he thinks I'm stupid as hell because he says he's a mage, and he's no such shit. He's _something_ \-- dude, he took down at least _two_ daedra, like who does shit like that? – but I can't pinpoint it.”

 

“Well, if it makes you feel better, he smells like a wolf.”

 

“Sure doesn't act like one.”

 

Scott 'hmm'd', rolling the thought over in his head while they walked straight through the Clearing and back into deeper woods.

 

“I agree, for the record. But he smells exactly like a wolf. Not a werewolf, but absolutely a wolf.”

 

“And?”

 

“And something else. He smells fucking _weird_ , I can't place it.” Scott shoved his hands in his pockets as they stomped along. “It's nothing I've ever smelled before.”

 

“Seriously?”

 

Scott looked guilty for a moment. “Well.”

 

“Stop hiding shit from me, you frick.”

 

“Ha! As if I could.” Scott reached out looped his arm through Stiles, dragging his best friend closer. “Do you want blisterwart?”

 

“I always do.”

 

They paused, Scott yanked up the fungus for Stiles to put away, and then continued on.

 

“So, the red nirnroot.” Scott started, and Stiles heaved an over dramatic sigh.

 

“Okay, I was at the College of Winterhold for--”

 

“Five years.”

 

“Don't be bitter, I'm better than ever.” Stiles gave Scott a little squeeze, as he played at sulking.

 

Scott had stayed in Beacon Hills for college, opting to simply commute to his University, much like the rest of their pack. Stiles was the only one who packed up and headed out of the country for school. The College of Winterhold was, obviously, in Winterhold, in the north near the tippy top, on a secluded island made of ice and rock. Only those with magic skill – or someone with a guide – could make it past the illusions that lead to the School. Once Stiles arrived, magic closed behind him, and he made it a point to not look back. Sans for Scott's nearly nightly skype calls, and the rest of the pack's visits every six or so months, Stiles was enclosed in a world of spells, scrolls, atronachs and elves.

 

He almost missed it, at times. A place where magic was accepted and encouraged, where using his power to do typical things was normal. His ears and eyes weren't strange, his desire to _know_ was encouraged, and as much as altmer (older ones, mostly) were sort of pricks, he felt at home, away from his home.

 

“So, with nirnroot, it’s like, one of my favorite things. With the right secondary ingredients, you can make poisons, resistance elixirs, and since I have a few ice wraith teeth, I can probably manage an invisibility potion.”

 

“Okay?”

 

Stiles scowled. “Nirnroot glows and chimes because it gets his power from Nirn itself. That's why it's so hard to grow and cultivate, you have to be able to draw power from the earth, or you'll just get weeds that look like nirnroot.”

 

“Uh huh.”

 

“Asshole. What I'm saying is that Nirn's power wouldn't cause the nirnroot to look blood red. I don't have a goddamn clue why it looks blood red. I don't know if it's something we should be worried about, either.”

 

Scott made a little noise, as if he didn't have anything to say, and pushed back the underbrush of the forest in front of him. Stiles could hear the chime of _something_ that sounded like nirnroot, but it was dull and low and it sounded _wrong_ to his sensitive ears.

 

“Yeah, there’s a bunch out here, just growing around--” Scott started but Stiles rushed ahead, eyes widened in alarm.

 

“A dwemer construct. Fuck.”

 

“Dwemer? In Beacon Hills?”

 

“Not as rare as you'd think,” Stiles sighed, distracted. He dropped his bag next to the rock and gold construct, pulling out a jar to collect samples in. “What's the air smell like around here?”

 

Scott sniffed delicately, getting a snort from Stiles for his efforts. “Prick. It smells normal around here, I guess. Like our territory, but--”

 

“There it is.”

 

“It smells bloody. No one's blood in particular, but it doesn't smell like any animal's blood, either. It just smells--”

 

“Rank.” Stiles finished, plucking the flora from low in its leaves, so as to pluck the roots out with it. “It smells wrong to me, like the scent is meaty. Rotten meat.”

 

Scott plucked up a few of the bunches of leaves as well, nose curled up in disgust. “I hate that meaty was the word that you decided to use there.”

 

Stiles shrugged, carefully tugging up a bigger patch of the root, roots and dirt and put it in its own jar. It would be worth watching for a few days.

 

With samples in their jars and carefully tucked away, Stiles got back to his feet to examine the dwemer pillar. It came up to just under his chest, obviously centuries old and made of metal reinforced stones. On the top was something Stiles recognized from other dwemer pieces he had found – intricate, golden designs, flecked with a strange sort of blue gem-like material that he didn't know. The contraption looked like some sort of holder to him, as if he were supposed to place something on it that would lock into place.

 

It might be a lock, for all he knew, and he didn’t know much about the Dwemer.

 

“I'm going to have to bring Braeden up here, I can't make heads or tails of this dwemer shit.”

 

“Weren't they wiped out in the third era? They were elves, right?” Scott asked, examining the piece of dwemer mystery.

 

“Before even that, maybe?” Stiles scratched idly at the scruff along his jaw. “All I know is that the dwemer were fucking _evil._ Brilliant, obviously, but those fuckers were evil. I mean, back at school, I was reading about the Falmer – the snow elves – and how in the fourth era they were said to be blinded by centuries of living underground? Yeah, fuckin' nope, they were made into slaves by the dwemer and _devolved_. Blinded, purposefully. Psychotic.”

 

“Mm.” Scott grunted, his nose twitched as Stiles was talking, alerting the human to something else in the area.

 

Stiles frowned, his posture becoming tense as Scott started to growl low in his throat; it was a warning.

 

“Stiles--”

 

“I know,” Stiles murmured quietly, inching to stand at Scott's back, the glowing blue of _ironflesh_ charged in his hand to be released at any second. Scott seemed perturbed, the barest edge of hostile in his stance, and Stiles swallowed sharply. He didn't bring anything with him and if something was out there, it was just him, Scott and his bare hands.

 

He could probably take on the world with Scott at his back.

 

“Come out!” and that was Scott's wolf voice, the voice that Stiles' usually associated with Scott's barely human _glabro_ form. “Show yourself!”

 

Stiles let out a slow breath, as even he could hear three pairs of footsteps crunching on the fallen twigs and and logs that littered the forest floor.

 

“You're the alpha?” came a feminine voice from still just inside the safety of the forest. “Please, help us, grant us sanctuary, I don't care just-- fuck, help _him,_ please.”

 

The voice sounded frantic, _terrified_ , and Stiles' defensive stance went slack.

 

“Come into the light.” he said, keeping his voice light and calm, like he did with wolves close to frenzy.

 

Three figures shuffled out of the forest, slowly and warily, and Stiles tensed up again, holding his breath against an ambush, only for the moon to shine on the shuffling figures and Scott to drop his stance completely, and race to their sides.

 

Stiles hesitated, stepping in the right direction, letting Scott's instincts lead them; hopefully not into a trap. Scott raced ahead, giving Stiles' a second of surprise before running after the wolf, the figures coming into focus.

 

“Erica?” Scott ventured, rushing up to them. Stiles wanted to hold back, wolves in their _glabro_ form were forces of nature, with a solid extra eight inches on their non-transformed heights and twenty pounds of pure, flesh-ripping muscle. He rushed up with confidence that he didn't have in this situation, his jaw dropping as he recognized Erica Reyes, wolfed out features making her look imposing.  

 

“Help him!” Begged the dark haired wolf in the middle, holding a oversized bundle in her arms that she began to lower to the ground and push back the blanket that covered her passenger.

 

A healing spell came to Stiles' hands as he got to his knees. The warm, red spell flowed into what Stiles assumed was another werewolf, so he increased the intensity of the power coming from his hands.

 

“Come on, Derek, you're going to be fine. We brought you home, we're home, okay? We're home.”

 

“Wait. _Derek?”_


	3. and we'll run like hell and get clear of this place

Derek Hale dipped in and out of Stiles' life much like the waves of the tide, dipping in close before pulling away completely, and repeating, ad nauseam.

 

Stiles' family, specifically Stiles' mother, moved to Beacon Hills because it was full of magic. Power was seeped into the very ground, bringing to life a town that was ripe with flowers that gleamed in the moonlight, wolves that howled late at night. You could taste the magic on your tongue, if you knew what you were looking for.

 

She was looking for shelter in a world that wouldn't understand half of her, she was looking for somewhere to hide without judgement. But she got Beacon Hills, which wasn't anywhere to hide. It was somewhere she could exist with her family, where the shield of the masquerade was a little flimsy, but no one in town cared.

 

As far back as Stiles remembers, the name Hale carried weight in the town. He could remember the Hales in two iterations, before the fire and after the fire; and after the fire were his most vivid memories.

 

The passed down memory of a known witch being torn to pieces, of death that still feels like it's just barely scabbing over, then the Hale fire, then _space_ and then Scott got bit.

 

Derek was there for that, and for the blur that was high school. Sometimes he was like the tide, appearing and backing away with just as much grace. But sometimes Derek was just like a _wave,_ crashing into the shore and destroying everything in its path.

 

Stiles never knew terribly much about him, just the Important Things, the unbreakable facts about Derek Hale that made him who he was, and why Stiles spent the ages sixteen to eighteen (to twenty one, if he was going to be honest with himself) avoiding him.

 

Stiles was around ten when he found his mother's practical magic books, twelve when he finished reading _The Door To Oblivion_ , and fourteen when casting simple spells was just that – simple.

 

He was sixteen when he finally _met_ Derek, who wanted nothing to do with him, and sixteen and a half when he learned that Derek's family was killed by hunters, and more specifically, _mage_ hunters.

 

The first bullet point on any written list of Important Things About Derek Hale should be: _He hates magic users._

  


Stiles stared at Derek's rather impressive _lupus_ form, all while picking at the bracelet on his wrist. It was very obviously enchanted, and anyone with any sort of knowledge about enchanting could see that-- but Stiles, for the life of him, could not figure out what the enchantment was. The bracelet was a gift from his father; it once belonged to his mother and the Sheriff thought it fit Stiles' wrist perfectly when his tenth birthday rolled around. It was made of flexible black leather, woven together to make a band that fit across his wrist, with a curious sort of blue crystal that seemed to glow with a soft magic aura whenever Stiles used a spell.

 

Not to say that he knew what the crystal was, _no one did_ , but it was pretty, and had been on his wrist for thirteen trying years, ever since he showed his dad the ball of light that he later learned was called magelight.

 

On his other wrist, he had a pair of enchanted prayer beads from the Arch-Mage himself, but he actually did take those off at times. The pendants for Auri-El and Magnus dangled from the beads, and Stiles tended to fiddle with them, if left to his own devices.

 

“Shouldn't he be shifting back?” Stiles looked up from Derek's black fur to see Scott leaning against the door, rubbing his eyes. Stiles blinked, taking in Scott's expression and puppy decorated scrubs.  

 

“Apparently not. Cora said the hasn't been able to shift back, so he's stuck like this for awhile.”

 

Scott was quiet, padding into the room in that silent sort of way that only werewolves seemed to be able to. He sat down next to Stiles, who resumed toying with the seemingly unbreakable leather of his bracelet, anxiety obvious in the bunched together muscles in Stiles' back. It had been a little touch and go for awhile, with Stiles pouring his magical reserves into the healing spell that emanated from his hands, while Core frantically explained what happened.

 

But it was a blur for Stiles, who was barely listening, entirely focused on closing open wounds and clearing obvious signs of silver poisoning.

 

Back at the house, he and Scott were far better able to care for Derek, setting up an IV that Scott had taken from work, and letting Stiles continue cleaning out Derek's system. Stiles wasn't _amazing_ at restoration in school, but he was with wards, which were _technically_ part of the restoration school, and Stiles could easily mention that he was scared shitless from the moment he realized it was Derek.

 

“Isn't that sort of fucking weird, though?” Stiles went on, as Scott rested his head on Stiles' shoulder.

 

“What is.”

 

“It's fucking wild to me, like. Lupus werewolves are _born wolves_. They're born as fucking animals--”

 

“Christ, Stiles.”

 

“And then they can just switch back and forth. It's weird enough that a human can just, _woops_ , I'm a fucking wolf, but it's so strange to think that dude's just... a wolf.”

 

“That's not at all what happens, you incredible fucking weenie,” Scott said after a beat, his tone matter-of-fact. “Born wolves are born human, they just have the ability to shift. And if that's what you've been sitting here, zoned out about while I was at work, I don't know what to say.”

 

Stiles let out a slow breath, tilting his head to lay against Scott's. “Wait, I thought you were working the overnight tonight?”

 

“Mhm.”

 

“What--”

 

“You've been sitting here since midnight.”

 

“And it's what, two?”

 

“It's nine am, and I'm here to either punch you in the head so hard you fall asleep or just put you to bed.”

 

“Does Kira know about this?”

 

“Yeah, okay,” Scott sat up and got to his feet, hauling Stiles up as well in one fluid motion, throwing his best friend over his shoulder. “Work was weird, by the way, thanks for asking.”

 

“Sorry, honey.” Stiles retorted, settling onto Scott's shoulder with no resistance. By all rights, he could have fought back a bit more than just using his words that Scott could see through, but he didn't want anyone to know more than they had to. Sitting in a room with Derek, more or less alone in his thoughts for the last nine or so hours (Derek's pack dipping in to check on him didn't count really, he barely acknowledged them, in fact) was a recipe for disaster.

 

“Ooh, you finally got Stiles out, huh?”

 

“Hey, Erica.” Stiles sat up a little against Scott's back to give Erica a flippant wave, his fingers itching to flip her a single finger. She looked miles better than how he had seen her earlier in the night; first with vexed werewolf features, then, as she calmed down, with a tired, drawn look on her face, and deep, dark circles under her eyes. “Consider this me tagging you in.”

 

“Ha, like I need a tag in. Get some sleep, dude, he's gonna be fine.”

 

Stiles grunted, taking the unsaid gratitude in her voice for the thanks that it was as Scott continued down the hallway and down the staircase.

 

The sun was warm and bright and too much for Stiles' exhausted eyes to deal with, so he let himself be manhandled through Braeden's house. His and Braeden's house.

 

Sort of.

 

Look, _he_ paid rent and ran her side of Wolf's Bane when she was on an assignment, unlike the rest of the freeloaders he called his pack.  So, it was his as well. Allison just happened to live there as well. The pack just happened to sleep there every weekend. Sometimes during the week.  And ate everything in sight.

 

He wouldn't trade them for anything.

 

“The poison is out of his system, I got the silver off him and he's stable.” Stiles recited, fingers drumming against Scott's back as Scott pushed open the door to Stiles' room.

 

“He's been stable since we got him hooked up to the IV, we just need him to change back already.” Scott tossed Stiles onto his bed without warning. It was exceptionally large and made of memory foam, which is why Stiles so often woke up to someone curled under his chin. “Seriously. He's going to be fine, and you two can beat the shit out of each other if you want or fuck each other stupid.”

 

Stiles probably had the best room in the house, next to the den, because his room was just like a den. It was warm and cozy all the time, and smelt like the forest, of cloves and cinnamon, of Stiles, of the pack who wandered in and out as long as the door was open. The floor was wooden so it was easy to sweep, windows covered with thick printed sheets that could be pulled open. Instead of lights, Stiles had simply hung taproot through his room, the gleaming roots adding enough light to see by, but not too much light that he couldn't sleep. Admittedly, it was often a mess; old books piled on and around his desk that had his desktop on it, jars with special ingredients and bunches of dried ingredients were like litter in Stiles' room.

 

“I regret telling you anything, ever, in the history of all the things I've told you.” Stiles whined, kicking his legs.

 

“I regret letting you get me drunk enough to hear it all in the first place. Take off your pants.”

 

“Seriously, where is Kira? Is this gonna be a threesome?”

 

Scott decided not to answer, as he’d taken to doing, and stripped off his scrubs instead. “I'm going to shower blood, sweat and probably piss off me, and then I'm going to sleep, because I don't have work tonight. You have to be sleeping before I come out--”

 

“Is that a threat?”

 

“Unless you want to stay up so I can practice pulling blood on you, maybe?”

 

There was the clink of Stiles unbuckling his belt, and Scott snorted, disappearing into the bathroom.

  


When Derek left Beacon Hills, Stiles was seventeen, exhausted in a way that even a straight week of sleep couldn't fix, and he was almost positive he would never lay eyes on Derek Hale again. Derek left with blood on his claws, a howl on his lips, rage in his heart and Erica and Boyd trailing after him.

 

Scott said they would probably be back in the evening, but several evenings passed, several weeks, and then Stiles was a senior and there was no way Derek was coming back. Ever.

 

So, they made due. Made a little pack of humans and wolves, and marked out their territory. Stiles balanced school and practice and games and college applications and meeting with werewolves who were “only doing it for the Hales”. Scott tried to train Isaac and Jackson (both of them needed an alpha, _their_ alpha, badly), bit Danny, on mostly accident, Stiles almost died a total of seven times and then received a letter from the Mage's' College in Winterhold.

 

He hid it under his bed, all the way until he was walking down the aisle with a diploma in his hand and a middle finger to Beacon Hills High School.

 

His father knew, of course. Knew the letter would be coming, knew that Stiles would jump on the chance to accept, knew that Stiles had been tormenting himself with selfish barbs since the day he laid eyes on that letter.

 

“It's okay,” was all Stiles needed to hear before he accepted, told Scott, and packed up his clothes for a plane to Winterhold, and didn't tell anyone else.

 

He did his duties, as promised, all from a distance, and flew in when he needed to, when Scott's word wasn't enough, and when there was harder choices to make. He was there for all of it, a subtle change in him every time he came to visit.

 

Brown eyes, flecked with gold, glowing subtly with magic. Long ears that were once hidden behind illusions and hats were pierced with jewelry made of ebony, magic and spells slipping from fingers that were once afraid of _sparks._

 

It certainly set them apart from other packs in the state, very few wanted to create a mess with a mage, and Stiles, ever the one for dramatics, would play up his Altmer features, giving any Alpha a pause.

 

They didn't have an Alpha. But they had a lot of other things that the packs around the state wanted, and for Stiles' years away at the College, it was enough.

  


Stiles got up maybe six hours later, not completely rested, but it was enough that he didn't sink back into his blankets. The house was alive with the sound of the pack, and other voices that Stiles assumed were the rest of Derek's pack. There would be a lot to deal with once Derek woke up, a million questions to answer and dynamics to understand, and if Stiles wanted to be honest with himself, he wanted absolutely nothing to do with those conversations.

 

He didn't have anything to say, after all.

 

He didn't bother looking for his clothes that he abandoned from this morning, he barely even glanced in the mirror before throwing on a pair of sweats that were in the bathroom and one of Scott's cleanish smelling shirts.

 

He cracked his knuckles as he walked down the winding staircase to the den, the happy voices of the pack leading him straight to them. He heard Kira squeal as he got closer to see the girls all surrounding Erica, who was beaming.

 

“What'd I miss?” Stiles asked, plucking a peach from the fruit basket on the kitchen's island.

 

“About six hours and take out.” Kira tutted, giving him a once over. She knew him too well. “Are you okay?”

 

“That's a loaded question if I've ever heard one.” Stiles replied, instead of answering. “I could hear your excited squealing from upstairs, what's going on?”

 

“I'm pregnant!” Erica announced, bouncing up and down slightly. Stiles eyes widened slightly and he glanced down. Low and behold, Erica did already have a bump, probably hidden by fur last night.

 

“That's... Wow.”

 

“Isn't it? Haven't really had a chance to go see a doctor or anything, but,” Erica's smile was warm and open in a way that it never was when she lived in Beacon Hills, but Stiles' found himself smiling back. “Derek said he hears two heartbeats fairly often, so it's twins.”

 

Silence swept the room, and if it's one thing Stiles could never call his pack mates, it was subtle. Lydia was staring right at him, and _fuck_ , there was no way he was dodging a conversation with her. With all of them, really, he never explained why Derek wasn't someone he wanted to talk about with them, ever. He avoided and shut down the conversations, focusing on the here and now, instead of the ifs and whens and befores, and he supposes it was cruel of him. His ever changing and evolving thoughts when it came to Derek drove his pack _insane._

 

Subtle, they were not, but any given wolf had perception in the form of admittedly rude scenting. Erica tilted her head at the sudden silence, glancing at Boyd, who shook his head once. Stiles wondered how much they knew.

 

“Do you have names for them?” Braeden asked, seeing as the silence wasn't going to go away without someone saying _something_. “How far along are you?”

 

“Sixteen weeks.” Erica's grin was infectious. “After all the shit with Derek, we decided to come back instead of running. It's safer here, and obviously, it's time to settle down.”

 

Her eyes narrowed playfully at Boyd, who's lips quirked up slightly.

 

“No names yet, but Derek just calls them the twins. He's so sure of it, and I hear the heartbeats too, so I can't say he's wrong. Just smug, so I hope it is just one.”

 

The girls laughed, and Stiles took the rest of his peach and trudged back to the basement bunker.

 

His and Braeden's house was on the outskirts of Beacon Hills, closer to the edge of the woods, out of view of the town. It was an open floor plan, mostly, with high ceilings for the wolves to be able to easily move around in, and wide spaces for their big, transformed bodies. The first floor was a living area; the kitchen and and dining room, one large room with an island closer to the kitchen, and the table closer to the high windows. The den was sunken, and took up most of the rest of the first floor, as a living room and den, and giant area for sprawling wolves.

 

Upstairs was three large bedrooms and two bathrooms, two of which were Stiles' and Braeden's bedrooms. Stiles supposed Erica and Boyd would take over the spare bedroom; Braeden wouldn't settle without their comfort.

 

The basement, where Derek was currently spread out, was mostly his and Braeden's alchemy workshop. But there was a medical bay as well, behind a black door, strictly for Scott's supernatural patients that didn't want to stay with Deaton. It was well outfitted with just about anything Scott could need to care for whatever non-humans came through, and being next to the workshop made it easier for Stiles to assist with magic.

 

Derek was still unconscious when he came down, but not alone, as Cora was sitting in Stiles' chair, hands wringing over her brother.

 

“Stiles,” Cora started, not even bothering to hide the fact that she was listening to his heartbeat. “He's going to wake up, right? They didn't-- he's going to wake up, soon, right?”

 

Cora's voice was trembling, and Stiles didn't know what to do for her. He knew she was Derek's sister, who was away when tragedy struck their family, but that's all he knew. Derek had mentioned trying to find her, and he obviously managed it at some point between his disappearance, seeing Stiles again, and being brought back to Beacon Hills.

 

Stiles needed Derek to wake up, but not for the same reasons that Cora did.

 

He was silent for a moment, taking in her obviously exhausted posture, bags under her eyes, her hair tangled but piled atop her head in a bun. Stiles felt bad for her.

 

“He will.” Stiles said with far more confidence than he actually felt. There was no reason for Derek _not_ to wake up, unless something had happened to him that Stiles didn't know about. He carefully waited until Cora looked at him, and held his hands up, glowing red with a healing spell. She met his eyes and nodded, so he moved forward, holding his hands above Derek's dark fur.  

 

Derek's energy felt a little better to him, less tainted, and he seemed to be breathing easier. A quick glance at the monitors that were connected him read stable, and nothing he needed to call Scott for.

 

Seeing Derek again was rough. After all their promises, and the complete silence on Derek's end, Stiles had forced himself to move on. He kept his promises to Derek, and according to Cora's story, Derek couldn't keep up his end. At the time, Stiles didn't know that, and even knowing that, he couldn't bring himself to let the bitterness fade away.

 

“I owe you some explanations, don't I?” Cora whispered, after a few moments of silence.

 

“You don't owe me anything.” Stiles answered quietly. “If you want to tell me, you can, but please. No one owes anyone anything.”

 

Cora huffed out a laugh. “You're sweet. I remember how he used to talk about you.”

 

“Oh really,” Stiles said, toneless.

 

“When we were in Winterhold, I thought that we were going to end up settling there, because he always came back to the cabin acting like he was floating on air. He used to talk about you like you put the stars in the sky.”

 

Stiles let out a slow breath, blinking back an itch in his eyes. “I'm sure he did.”

 

Cora cocked her head before facing Derek again, her eyes trained on his face. “What do you know about the Thalmor?”

 

Stiles paused. Asking if he was alright was enough of a loaded question for the day, he thought, but this... this went beyond loaded and straight into dangerous. “Why.”

 

“I think I should be able to ask an elf – an _altmer_ \-- that, without the attitude, don't you?”

 

“Really?” Stiles asked, his voice filled with faux playfulness. “Are you sure this is the conversation you want to have with me, right now? This second? Think about it, then try it again.”

 

Silence reigned over the room again, the only sounds being Derek's slow, deep breathing and the sounds of the heart monitor beating with his steady heartbeat.

 

“I was being held by the Thalmor, on the grounds of daedra worship.”

 

Stiles didn't bother saying that was illegal, because nothing was illegal when you weren't human, but he raised an eyebrow. The Thalmor were historically known as violent elven supremacists, but Stiles didn't know they still existed. Had Cora not said anything, he wouldn't have believed anyone who said otherwise.

 

“That's the excuse they used?”

 

Cora chuckled humorlessly, folding her hands primly in her lap. “Yes, to take me in for questioning. But that's not what they wanted.”

 

Stiles made a go on noise as he looked over Derek's vitals once more.

 

“They wanted to see how an alpha works. What makes them tick.”

 

“For fuckin' what?” Stiles said without thinking. “Any wolf could be an alpha.”

 

“Yes,” Cora agreed. “But not any wolf is a good leader, and only some wolves really are made to lead. A wolf's moon is a good indicator. A wolf's status of alpha can be revoked, as well. It's a fluid concept.”

 

All of which Stiles knew; he didn't know that it was some great wolf secret. Some of that was simply in history books, if you knew which books to read, and which books were meant to throw you off.

 

“You can't force it, though,” Cora went on. “It's a natural process. Some wolves are more prone to it depending on their auspices and what the pack needs.”

 

“Pack politics, got it.” Stiles lifted his hands away from Derek, cracked his knuckles and turned to really look at Cora. “So, they kept you--”

 

“In a fucking cage under their embassy in Haafingar for almost a fucking year, where they studied my reactions to alphas of different fucking auspices. They cut into me and watched me heal. They had wolves there that were bonded to the alphas, and they would _starve_ the bond to see how they reacted. They treated us all like animals, like experiments and never _spoke_ to us, like they were all above us, and when they no longer needed someone they were dragged away and _disposed_ of, as though they were just biohazardous waste, and, and--”

 

Stiles didn't know when Cora closed her eyes, but she looked surprised to see him on his knees in front of her, carefully wiping away the tears that had sprung from the corners of her eyes.

 

“It's okay, you're out now, you're fine now.” Stiles said, low and calm, as Cora gripped his hands as well, just for something to hang onto.

 

“No, I'm not,” she said, her eyes drifting shut. “I don't know what they did to him. And that scares me more than anything.”


	4. he ate my heart; that boy is a monster

What Derek Hale was doing in Winterhold, Stiles didn't know. He _did_ know that Derek had absolutely no right, none at all, to be demanding answers out of him.

 

“You _left._ You're not my alpha, and I don't owe you a fucking _thing_.”

 

Initiates of the College of Winterhold were required to remain on the grounds of the College until their junior year, or when they exhibited enough control over their magic.

 

And while this was his third year at the College, Stiles had been able to wander in and around Winterhold proper since he was eighteen years old, when he was caught in The Midden, which was underneath the College, encased in an impressive muffle spell. He was twenty-one now, and while muffle was the least of his teacher's troubles when it came to him, he was at least allowed to wander Winterhold to his heart's content.

 

Stiles had his haunts, some of the places he had taken Scott when he visited, places where he could step in and dispel the illusion around the features he had come to accept.

 

He had decided to take on a heavier courseload for the year, simply because taking half year courses were almost worthless to him-- the full ten months worked far better for him and the way he learned. That said, the second part of his term had just gotten underway, and he was at his favorite coffee shop, working on his thesis for Gestor's class.

 

On the College grounds, students were required to wear their robes, signifying their year and rank among the initiates, but once you left the grounds, you could wear casual clothing. Stiles took full advantage of that, and opted to look as college boy in desperate need of an espresso as he could.

 

Books were spread before him, laptop propped on his lap, word processor showing the development of his thesis on the mortality in necromancy.

 

It was in that very second that Derek decided to sit down on the low couch across from where Stiles was sitting. Stiles barely twitched. It's not like Derek was the only wolf in the room, as the owner was in today, and was a wolf as well.

 

He wouldn't start anything, would he?

 

“Did you need something,” Stiles asked, eyes still trained on his laptop screen. “Or are we still pretending you can't open your mouth and say something after almost five years?”

 

Perhaps Derek wouldn't start anything, but it didn't mean that Stiles was settled with the fact that Derek just _left_ , left Jackson and Isaac to struggle with their powers alone, left all of them, and for what? Stiles still didn't know, he was on the verge of simply _not caring_ , and Derek was still staring at him; silent and infuriatingly calm.

 

“Just seeing how my pack is doing.”

 

Stiles exploded.

  


Derek's pack visited the medical bay daily, running into either Stiles or Cora, who watched over Derek with careful eyes. Boyd always sat quietly for short bursts of time, as if he needed steadying. Erica sat, held Derek's paw and chatted with him about what the twins were up to. It was all very mundane, and it would be cute to Stiles if he didn't feel the waves of grief pouring off them.

 

Scott's plate was more than full with strange accidents keeping him working doubles, days at the hospital, nights spent with Deaton working with fae who started to grow some strange sort of red spore like crust on their wings. Stiles worked from the medical bay mostly, flicking through dusty books with a laptop balanced on his knee, trying to translate fucking _Scandinavian_ and goddamn _Egyptian hieroglyphs._

 

Being a supernatural consultation service was _garbage._ The hours were trash, the lore was a headache to sift through, the only other language that he actively could speak was French. Not Latin. Not Elven, at least when he was away from school. Not even _“_ proper”French. Shitty French Canadian French with a Cali accent.

 

Work oddly seemed to pick back up, or, Stiles thought privately, came down on them hard with Derek back. It's like his scent was the air and a new pack higher up north was requesting written treaties and Stiles had to sit down with Scott, and possibly Cora, to discuss the treaties they had left to look over.

 

It was mostly the sick fae in their area that took up most their time; Stiles had to split his time between various consolations, researching the fae problem and running both sides of the store in Braeden's stead, as she was called away with Allison to Riften for some godforsaken reason. Stiles wasn't listening, but that did mean it was just him and Scott holding fort, which was difficult. Integrating the two packs would be difficult; even if they all knew each other, instincts were running high with a pregnant ahroun around, and two other ahroun?

 

Stiles had already gotten in between two brewing fights, but he knew he wasn't enough. Erica, Isaac and Jackson would have to fight it out or wrestle it out, or _something,_ but Derek, being the person that bit them, would have to be there for it.

 

Stiles seemed to be the only person that Cora would talk to about the Thalmor, even after he told her about his own stories about the Thalmor at the College. Cora was clearly deeply affected by her imprisonment, but didn't seem to want to speak to anyone else about it. When he was in the med bay late at night, the day’s worries having had worn him down, he would come down to the basement. He still wanted to see that Derek was alright. Cora would be waiting, and she would rest her head on his shoulder and talk about Derek, or say what she couldn't say to other ears.

 

“I don't know what they were doing to him.” Cora said quietly, on the sixth day of the work hellscape and their return. “They didn't have him as long as me, but they probably knew more when they had him. He's an alpha, Stiles, what if they fucked with that?”

 

Stiles grunted. He couldn't really afford the brain power to consider what ifs, he needed straight facts to work or even respond really, but he let Cora lay her head on his shoulder and whisper quietly to him, sometimes not even really speaking to him.

 

His research wasn't leading to any solid results, so he supposed his next best option was was simply– ha, ha, _fuck_ – creating an antidote to clear up the spores, or at least something to buy them some time. According to the reports given by the little clan of Fae that lived in Beacon Hills, the spores weren't _doing_ anything to them, really, but the spores crusted on their wings, right where their wings connected to their skin, and if the pack could find it in their hearts to help them out, the fae would be forever thankful. Stiles saw no reason to refuse.

 

It would probably be another all nighter, or if he was a little luckier, a nap in between.

 

He spun a pen around his finger before sticking it in between the pages of the text he was reading, shutting it and closing his laptop, piling the two on top of each other.

 

“Derek, buddy, you really have to wake up, my dude,” Stiles huffed. “You can't just keep snoring away while we're all busting our asses out here and your pack needs you.”

 

Cora snorted in a decidedly unladylike manner. If it's one thing Stiles had noticed in the last few days, it was that Cora was very much a _fucking_ lady. She sat up, stretching her arms over her head as Stiles got to his feet, marching over to Derek's bed with purpose.

 

“I'm gonna kick your ass when you get up. I have a pair of silver knuckles, you know that? Right in the eyeball, dude. I'm serious.”

 

Derek didn't stir, remaining almost motionless, save for the rise and fall of his chest. Stiles rubbed his eyes, stepping closer. He ran a hand through thick fur that he knew smelt of the forest in the summer, warm, dried spices and something that seemed unique to wolves.

 

“Hey, Cora, how hungry is he gonna be when he-- oh, yikes.” Stiles caught the look in Cora's eyes, her eyes flashing gold for a brief moment. A warning, Stiles knew. “What's the face for?”

 

“Someone's in the house. I don't know who it is.”

 

“Doing?”

 

“Asking-- um, Scott, right?” Stiles nodded. “Yeah, asking Scott where you are. Scott doesn't seem upset, but I don't know the person. He doesn't make any noise when he walks.”

 

Stiles sighed openly at that statement. If it was something to be worried about, Scott could handle it, probably, but Cora's observation was a little unsettling. Managing to sneak up on a werewolf was an almost impossible task.

 

He turned and ran one more affectionate hand through Derek's dense black fur before leaving the med bay and taking the steps two at a time back up to the house.

 

“Stiles!” Scott called, and he sounded cheerful, so Stiles' posture relaxed and he walked towards the sound of Scott's infectious laughter.

 

“Dude, how the hell do you know where I live?” Stiles shouted as he got closer and saw Nickolas sitting at the kitchen island with Scott, and much to his never ending pain, Lydia, who was smiling famously.

 

“Well, Ms. Lydia here told me when I went to Wolf's Bane and you guys were closed.” Stiles winced. With both Allison and Braeden out of town, Stiles had to split duty with Kira, who was more often than not busy, which meant the store had been closed for two days. Nickolas didn't show up _that_ often.

 

Stiles frowned.

 

“Imagine my surprise when he came to the front, looking for you.” Lydia continued, her red painted nails tapping on the marble counter top. “asking about a delivery that I knew for a fact that we didn't order.”

 

“Nosy.” Stiles chided, leaning against the counter.

 

“So, I'll assume he's the one who sucks Molag Bal's dick for the shipment?”

 

Nickolas burst out laughing, half covering his face as he did so, eyes scrunched up with glee. “You told her about that? Mora alive, you're a dickhead.”

  
“It's why I can't sleep at night, I know it.” Stiles gave Lydia a _look_ , but her smile was still blinding, and he knew he was in for it later. “What did you get me?”

 

“Void salts, mostly. Somewhat wanted to get to know my new soon-to-be neighbors.”

 

“Haha, shit, your sister caught you?”

 

“I wish all she did was catch me,” Nick said, his voice bordering on sheepish. “She rented a place here, right in town. I know this because I was walking down main last night, and dude, she pulled up next to me in this fucking chrome lambo, sun glasses on her face and was like 'Get in, we're going home'. Home being on Evergreen ave, apparently.”

 

“Sorry, dude. Or maybe not.” Stiles gave a half shrug, his arms folded against his stomach. “We're still good for the deal, though, right?”

 

“Yeah, of course. I guess this is just my new home base. I was right by the way.”

 

“About?”

 

“My sister wants to meet the alpha of the town. You don't just settle down without introducing yourself, so she's kind of pissy about it now.”

 

“Uh...” Stiles started, his eyes flicking quickly to Scott, who frowned at him.

 

“I told her that I already knew you guys, so it was okay, but she's really insistent. Tradition, I guess.”

 

“Well – uh,” Scott started, eyes darting to Stiles' briefly before plastering a lopsided grin on his face. “The pack's alpha just got back from a long trip, so he's not feeling so great. Probably wouldn't want to receive um... visitors? But, we'll let him know!”

 

Nickolas titled his head, seemingly content with that answer. “What's his name?”

 

“Derek.”

 

“As in Hale? Derek Hale? He's alpha?”

 

“Y...es? Yeah.”

 

Nickolas' face shifted in surprise. “I didn't know he was old enough to run his own pack. Huh.”

 

“You know him?” Lydia asked, obviously more curious in Nickolas than Stiles wanted her to be.

 

“My sister knew his mother.”

 

“Oh, really--”

 

In that moment, Cora appeared, beauty, grace and gold flashing eyes. Stiles jumped a little. If he wasn't on alert, and he rarely was at home, werewolves had a bad habit of sneaking up on him.

 

“I need to borrow Stiles and Scott.” Cora said, her voice prim as she wrapped her fingers around Stiles' bicep. “There's a problem in the basement.”

  
  


Stiles studied in three different places – his dorm room, the arcanaeum, and the coffee shop in Winterhold proper, where Derek decided to be a raging _asshole._

 

Stiles didn't return there for a few days, steaming in his dorm room, much to his roommate's amusement. His roommate, Brayven, was a dark elf, and easily amused by all of Stiles' hilariously human issues. Brayven's skin was a lighter shade of grey, his looks typical elven sharp, long ears and purple eyes.

 

“Stilevarion, isn't it his pack, though?” Brayven was the first person Stiles met at the College, and they remained roommates each year. Brayven was also the first person to say _Stilevarion_ with the accents all in the correct places when Stiles arrived, the exact way his mother used to say it. It made him warm, it made him happy, and their friendship came easily.

 

“Not... really?” Stiles closed his necromancy book, and bit his lip. “How much do you know about werewolves?”

 

“They're emotionally connected and are really bad with magic? Competent alchemists when taught.” Brayven shrugged helplessly. As far as as Stiles knew, Brayven was from Morrowind. Stiles hadn't the foggiest idea where that was, but Brayven had helpfully explained that was the point. Humans weren't supposed to know where Morrowind was, and that's why dark elves lived in peace.

 

Lucky them.

 

“Alright, well. There's a lot of weird kind of mythos around them, but werewolves aren't all that complicated once you understand them farther than just a threat. So, for a wolf, your biggest defining characteristic is what moon you were born or bitten under, and that's your _auspice._  I like to think of it as the wolf inside of a person. There's five different auspices depending on the phase of the moon your wolf was born under, which kind of sets up your position in the pack, yadda, yadda, anyway, the point is, some wolves are just more prone to lead and become alphas. People make a big deal of who the alpha in a pack is, but the alpha is pretty much just the most dominant member of the pack, and who speaks for the pack. It can go deeper if the pack has settled somewhere and made it their territory, but most territories are family held.”

 

“And... that would be this Derek fellow?”

 

“Dude, _I guess_. Out of all the wolves I know, he's the oldest. His older sister is dead, his uncle is... missing, I guess is the best word for it. He's the only born wolf I know, and his auspice is _Philodox_. He was born under a half moon, and philodox, traditionally, lead the pack. On top of that, the town I'm from is his family's territory and has been for well over a hundred years. So everything points to him leading the pack, right?”

 

“Right..?” Brayven agreed slowly, as if he couldn't understand what Stiles' issue was. And to be fair, a lot of the time, Stiles' issues were beyond Brayven's scope of knowledge. Before Stiles, Brayven had never even seen a Breton before, much less a werewolf. “So what's the problem?”

 

“Derek's a raging assbag with the emotional depth of a puddle. It's such a fuckin' long story, like years of me having to deal with Derek Hale's issues, and cleaning up a mess that I didn't _want_ any part of.”

 

“I don't get it. If he's supposed to be alpha, then why isn't he?”

 

“Oh, he's _an_ alpha, but he sure the fuck isn't _my_ alpha, and isn't the alpha to _my_ fuckin' pack. Mine and Scott's. And Braeden's. The three of us handled things, when he just left. There's two wolves in our pack that were bitten by him, and he abandoned them. I feel like we've just managed to find our footing, and we've been without him since he left in my junior year of high school.”

 

“He sounds like a real dickhead.” Brayven started, rising from his bed. “But you don't seem to  know all that much about him.”

 

“I don't.” Stiles admitted easily. When was he going to get to know Derek? All his interactions with Derek were either violent, going to be violent, or pulling each other's hides out of the fire. And if it wasn't that, it was barely restrained civil conversations or the pair of them agitating each other.  “I didn't exactly have the time to sit down and have a heart to heart with the dude who seemed to enjoy slamming my head into things. Did I mention his family was killed by mages? No? That happened. Killed by mage-hunters, and if I so much as twitched in his general direction with a spell in my hands, he'd flip out.”

 

“And rightfully so, your skill with destruction magic is garbage.”

 

Stiles scowled. He didn't know any destruction magic in high school, so fuck that little quip. “But you see my point, then, obviously? Where exactly in the fuck does he get off asking about _his_ pack?”

 

“Stiles, I'm only telling you this because we're friends, and I care about you, but you are one dense guy sometimes.”

 

Stiles scowled, and opened his mouth to retort, but Brayven held up his hand. “You're _human_ , and this Derek fellow is a werewolf. You may help run a pack, and if it's anything like being part of a House,” Brayven was part of the House Telvanni; houses in Elven culture were a bit like packs. “Then there's a bond between similar people. There's Bosmer in our house, but they simply do not understand, not the way a fellow Dunmer would.”

 

“What?”

 

“I'll make it simple. You're human. You're a Breton. In fact, you're mostly Breton, with a little bit of Altmer in you, correct?”

 

“Unfortunately.”

 

“And even though you're a bit Altmer, you do not understand them, correct?”

 

“Do you? They're fuckin' pricks.”

 

“No disagreement from me. However, the fact that you _are_ Merkin and you still cannot understand your fellow Mer.... why do you think that you know better than an alpha werewolf what his pack needs?”

 

“They needed him,” Stiles hissed, spreading his arms wide as if to say 'no shit' but Brayven had been Stiles' roommate for three years. He wasn't easily cowed. “And he abandoned them. All of them.”

 

“From what you've told me, he sounds tortured. Death hits a wolf hard; they're emotional creatures.”

 

“And why the fuck would I--”

 

“Look, I'm not saying forgive him for a slight that wasn't even against _you_ ,” Brayven interrupted, looking tired of the conversation. Stiles flinched. “But I am saying that you should try asking the werewolf for his point of view. He won't understand being a person with the power to shape reality, so why would you understand what it's like to shape shift and feel everything so very deeply?”

 

Stiles had nothing to say to that. Being in a pack, around werewolves so much made him almost immune to their little idiosyncrasies; he just saw them as people. Even in their various forms or in between forms, they were still just people, they were his _friends_. Admittedly, he didn't spend a lot of time dwelling on the differences between them.

 

“It makes you a bit of a sweetheart, I think,” Anton said, later, as they squared off in their combat class. He straightened up, and a glowing ball of purple that Stiles' knew was a conjuration spell grew in Anton's right hand. He released it as fast as he summoned it with a snapping sound, summoning a bound daedric bow and a quiver full of arrows. “Not every human is willing to put their ass on the line for a bunch of mongrels.”

 

Stiles rolled his eyes. Anton was the closest thing Stiles had to an ex-boyfriend, even if they never officially started dating, like he and Lydia had for awhile. Anton was simply the guy that helped him really, you know, find his prostate and discover he was sort of slut for that sort of thing. Six months of sex and dates sure felt like dating to Stiles, but Anton was also cold, distant, and occasionally a raging fuckface with a bad attitude. “Don't be a bitch, Tony.”

 

“Then don't call me Tony. Hands up.”

 

Stiles hands glowed with the blue spell that was typical for any warding spell, spreading into a wall of power. Anton took aim, swiftly shooting off three arrows that Stiles blocked with practiced ease. He was a bit older than Stiles – he didn't know how _much_ exactly, but Anton was brilliant and knowledgeable about illusions and a top notch enchanter.

 

“Why are you so worried about what he thinks?” Anton asked after dispelling the summoned bow, obviously content with Stiles' ward. “Honestly, Stiles, you barely know the guy.”

 

“I don't like things I don't understand. I don't get why he came to me with that bullshit. Where the fuck does he get off saying _his_ pack? Scott's been struggling to maintain and control his powers, he shouldn't have to do that, make a steady life for himself _and_ run a pack of wolves.”

 

Anton made a little considering noise, straightening himself up to his generous full height. Stiles didn't rest his stance, instead pointedly glancing at Anton's hands, alight with a frost spell of some kind. Anton was notably tall and notably lean for his height. He took good care of himself, but he would probably be called pretty – hazel eyes, fair skin, dark brown hair and a wide smile.

 

They circled each other for a moment, a slow, tense dance before Anton struck out, hands frozen and spiked. Stiles dodged and weaved to the best of his ability, which wasn't _that_ great – he found himself to be more scholarly than anything else. Anton struck out at him hard and fast enough that Stiles couldn't really do more than hold his ward and take the blows as they came.

 

“You're a jackass,” Stiles groaned later, from the ground as Anton squatted next to him, looking unrepentant. “I can't stand you, I want a new sparring partner, and I regret every hour you spent between my legs.”

 

“Sure you do,” Anton responded, his voice mild but obnoxiously cheerful. “You got your ass firmly handed to you, which is probably like orgasming to you.”

 

“Fuck off.”

 

“Yeah, alright. You wanna tell me why you're so hung up on this werewolf? It isn't the first time I've heard you mention the name Derek before.”

 

“I'm not hung up on him, fucker, cause if I was, would I have been nailing you?”

 

“If I'm recalling correctly, I was your rebound from what's-her-face. Lydia? Yeah, the red head.”

 

“I think she hates you more than she hates me for it.”

 

And to be fair, she hated Stiles for a solid year and a half for the stunt he pulled. They dated through senior year, and it was, well, it was okay, because Lydia was _Lydia_ by that point, not the untouchable goddess he had built her up as. It was _working_ , but not in the way Stiles had wanted it to work, not how he envisioned StilesandLydia, and when you're eighteen and control was looking at you in the shape of a college acceptance letter in _Winterhold_ , you know what you're going to pick.

 

He didn't have to leave without saying anything, though.

 

He deserved the dressing down Lydia gave him.

 

So yeah, Anton was a rebound; Anton was his fucking _TA_ for his magical combat class. But they were compatible, Stiles was curious, and Anton was willing.  

 

Lydia hated him the entire time he was with Anton, and the hate extended to Anton once they stopped being A Thing, and Stiles focused his extra time on fixing things between him and Lydia.

 

He's fairly sure Lydia still hates Anton.

 

“I don't care,” Anton brushed it aside, like he always did when Stiles mentioned someone besides Scott. “I care about you pulling your head out of your ass about this Derek guy.”

 

“My head isn't up my ass about him.”

 

Anton snorted, but not unkindly. “You're twisting yourself into knots, and for what? Because he, a werewolf, asked how the people he bit are?”

 

Stiles let out a long breath, sat up, and let Anton rub his back companionably.

 

“I don't want to get after school special on you, but I think all the running for your life when you were like sixteen means you didn't watch enough Lifetime--”

 

“You've got to be kidding me.”

 

“Shh. Sh. You need to learn to let shit go. Maybe it's because you're still so young,”

 

Stiles scowled. He was twenty one, not a child, but Anton went on, barely reacting to Stiles' scornful look.

 

“I'm not kidding, Stiles, you have to learn to let shit go. You did something shitty? Apologize if you must and move the fuck on.  Someone wronged you? Let it go and move the fuck on. Life is so short sometimes, you really want to stick your feet in the sand because some _mongrel_  said something you didn't like? You're a fucking mage. Who cares?”

 

“He's not a mongrel.”

 

Anton rolled his eyes. “Scott isn't a mongrel, if that's what you're trying to get at. Whatever Derek said to you? Let it go.”

 

Later that week, Stiles walked back into the coffee shop, giving a wave to the owner before settling down in his usual corner. He pulled his books and laptop out of his bag, intent on getting a chuck of research down, when a large take out cup of coffee was placed in front of him. He looked up to see Derek frowning down at him.

 

“I'm sorry.”


	5. guess i'd rather hurt than feel nothing at all

Derek had shifted to his _glabro_ form in his sleep.

 

Stiles took it as a good sign, since Scott let out a slow breath, and rushed forward to check his vitals.

 

“It was a little strange,” Cora started, her voice trembling. “He just let out this low, groaning sound and shifted back. He smells off.”

 

“Silver poisoning.” Scott replied after a moment. “C'mere, assistant, I'm gonna need a healing spell, and probably a clear poison for his IV.”

 

Stiles pushed himself off the wall, the quip that was resting on his tongue muted by the sight of Derek, human(ish) and whole and safe. The veins on his neck and wrists were black and standing hard against his skin in a way they couldn't see when he was covered in fur.

 

Derek looked different. Harder. Broader shouldered. Tense, even in his sleep.

Stiles knew Derek in a few different forms: pre-fire, in passing, and didn't really _know_ him until tragedy put bags under his eyes and anger on his tongue. After that Derek, it was the Derek that invaded his heart and filled his veins with euphoria and his mind with promises.

 

Stiles sucked his teeth in annoyance. His bitterness ran deeper than he thought when faced with Derek, and it clouded each and every promise that had fallen from Derek's lips with doubt.

 

Bitterness didn't, however, stop Stiles' heart from jumping when Derek snuffled in his healing sleep.

 

“I thought we got it all.” Stiles muttered, resting his hands above Derek's chest. Rebuilding Derek's weakened body to the point that he could start healing up himself was Stiles' priority.

 

Scott wiped at Derek's raw, red wrists with a swab dipped in alcohol to get the wounds they'd missed clean. “Whoever did this to him had no idea what they were doing. Unless they were trying to kill him slowly, over time, from exposure. His healing factor is working a bit, but it's not enough. We'll have to keep him healthy enough for it to come back. Whip up something to clear this up, yeah?”

 

Stiles nodded. “Aye, aye, Nurse McCall.”

 

He shuffled into the workshop, Cora trailing behind him.

 

“Can you turn on the water heater?” Stiles asked Cora, who was still quiet and a little twitchy. “I'm going to use oils instead of powder for this one, because I really have to get it out of his system before I can fix the damage.”

 

“Mhm.” Cora acquiesced, her hands fumbling over the switch.

 

Silver poisoning, while dangerous in heavy doses, was something that most wolves could shake off on their own, assuming they weren't shot with a silver bullet or slashed with a silver sword. Being consistently dosed with silver was a sure fire way to weaken a were’s immune system, destroy their healing factor and cause a slow, painful death.

 

It was probably why Derek couldn't completely shift down to his human form, either. He would need to draw from his powers to keep himself alive.

 

Cora was silent as Stiles bustled around the workshop, looking for his scarcely used oils and measuring them out, all the while muttering about the grossness of skeevers. She stood still while the potion bubbled away, before finally turning on her heel and marching up the staircase back up to the house, leaving Stiles with raised eyebrows and questions.

 

He would talk to her about it later.

 

The cure didn't take too long to settle, but it needed to cool, so Derek wouldn't have to deal with boiling liquids in his veins. Stiles let it sit for a few minutes, his mind buzzing with with everything and nothing at once, before he got sick of sitting. He filled a cup with ice and slid the vial of cure into it.

 

Scott was sitting in a chair, writing notes in his notebook of pack information, and Stiles assumed it was just him keeping track of how Derek was healing.

 

“After the cure is in him, give him another dose of healing, would you? There's no way to shock his system into healing unless I break his arm or something, and I really, really do not want to do that to him.”

 

“I really wish you weren't actual, factual trash with magic.”

 

“Even if I was decent with it, would you even let me do anything to him? I'm a ragabash, not theurge, prickface.”

 

Stiles grunted, bringing his hands to rest above Derek's chest, a healing spell spilling from his fingertips. It was a rarity to use magic as often as he had been using it lately. Besides his laziness that had him using his telekinesis spell more than strictly necessary, Stiles' magic was contained to being used for magelight and pressing healing spells into Braeden or Allison and sometimes Lydia.

 

He didn't want to admit that he was bored, but _gods_ , busy did not mean not bored.

 

“His healing factor is shot, isn't it?”

 

“No, he really just needs to get back on his feet and eating things again instead of this drip.” Scott attached the vial of cure to Derek's IV and watched as the greenish liquid dripped into his veins. “I _could_ wake him up, I would just have to swing by the hospital, but he probably needs the rest. His healing factor will probably get a good work out whenever he wakes up.”

 

“The Thalmor are after him, I think. And if they come here, we're all going to get a work out we don't _really_ need.”

 

Scott didn't respond to that, and Stiles wasn't sure if Scott even knew about the Thalmor or what it meant for them, especially considering what Cora had told him.

 

Stiles heaved out a sigh. “Scott, look.”

 

“Mm?”

 

“Have you thought about what we're going to do pack wise? They're clearly staying here, with us. And dude, Erica's pregnant. We'd be expanding, on top of mixing.”

 

“Sounds like the alpha's problem.”

 

“And that would be you, buddy. In everything but name.”

 

“That's so weird, I didn't know that me just being around while you and Braeden wrote treaties and fought with other _actual_ alphas made me an alpha. I gotta tell Kira!”

 

Stiles groaned. “You know we're a team, Scott. We all made this work, a so called ‘actual’ alpha or not.”

 

“And you know as well as I do that we can't stay like this. Wolves aren't solitary creatures that can wander around by themselves, they need packs, and packs _need_ alphas.”

 

“They do not--”

 

“They _do_ , and it's not me. I don't want to lead. Not even a little, not even fucking slightly, and I wish you would get that.”

 

Stiles jolted slightly, his spell wavering. He lifted his hands, and looked at his best friend, _really_ looked at him. “Scott--”

 

“Dude, no. Do you really know what an alpha is? Like, really and truly understand what it means to be an alpha to a pack?”

 

Stiles frowned and Scott scowled, twirling his pen around his finger. “I love my pack. You know I love all of you, without end, and I'd rather die than see any of you hurt when I could prevent that. But... the requirements. The expectations of being an alpha. I'm not... I'm not at a place where I want that.”

 

And as much as Stiles was rarely without something to say, this time, he was silent.

 

Derek's heartbeat monitor kept beeping steadily, and Scott went back to writing notes.

 

Along the course of their friendship they had eliminated the awkwardness and holding back. It was honest, it was solid, and their friendship was made up of shortcuts. Where other people would have to speak and communicate, Scott could rest his head on Stiles' shoulder or neck for a silent plea for affection. Stiles could grab Scott's wrist and give him half a glance and Scott would know exactly what he needed.

 

Soulmates weren't always romantic.

 

“Scotty?”

 

“Mm.”

 

“Scotty.”

 

Scott heaved out a long suffering sigh, and picked his eyes up from his notebook. “Yeah?”

 

Stiles made sure to catch his glance, dipping his head to meet eyes with Scott. “Wanna go running later? I want to see that dwemer construct again.”

 

“Yeah, sure.”

 

Stiles made a little sound in his throat, moving around Derek's cot to stand in front of Scott, his lower lip jutted out. “Scotty.”

 

Scott kept staring up at Stiles, face drawn and unimpressed. The alpha conversation pissed him off like nothing else, but it wasn't like Stiles brought up for no reason. In fact, Scott could probably list the reasons Stiles would bring it up, and at least thirty percent of that was Stiles own reluctance in wanting to _lead_ werewolves. He didn't want to lead werewolves anywhere but to clear out a steakhouse.

 

Scott kept staring, Stiles jutted his lower lip out further until Scott heaved out a sigh and got to his feet.

 

“You're a big baby, you know that, right?” Scott muttered, rubbing his cheek against Stiles' cheek and neck. “But I'm serious, dude. Derek is back. And you'll understand why I can't do this when he wakes up.”

 

“I believe you.”

 

When Derek's veins turned back to a healthy color, and his face looked rested, Stiles wandered upstairs to his room. Cora was nestled in the middle of his bed, her pretty blue sundress crumpled in a corner, and she had thrown on sweats instead.

 

“Am I already pack to you?” Stiles asked, his voice soft and easy as Cora picked her head up off a pillow.

 

She tilted her head, watching as Stiles shuffled around his room, rubbing his eyes. Nick had left some time ago, and sadly for Stiles, Lydia had gone with him.

 

Maybe it would end up being a good thing. At least he wouldn't be cornered by her for awhile yet.

 

“I've smelled you countless times on Derek's skin. I did wonder why he would ever let anyone who smelled elven anywhere near him, but,” Cora laid back down on Stiles' bed like it was hers, and to be fair, Stiles let pack in his room as long as his door was open. “I'm glad it was you.”

 

Stiles heaved a sigh. He didn't.  “You know we broke up, right?”

 

“Did you?”

 

“Yes.” Because lying to a wolf was simple once you knew what you were doing.

 

“He never mentioned that.”

 

“Yeah, well. Emotions and all that.” Stiles picked up his tablet and and headset, attaching the headset to his ear as Cora flopped back to the bed.

 

“Stiles?”

 

“That's me.”

 

“What's your real name?”

 

“Stiles isn't a fake name, Cor.”

 

She grunted, and Stiles started flicking through his work emails, and trying to listen to his messages.

 

All six messages were requests for call backs from his Braeden, his Father, and four clients confirming their appointments for-- shit, _tomorrow_ – so he made notes of that on the tablet and moved on to his emails.

 

“I'm just being nosy, for the record. I do care, I want to call you by your real name.”

 

“I like my nickname.” Stiles sat at his desk, flicking through some returned emails from the College, orders coming in, orders going out; the usual.

 

“I don't even know his name,” Jackson shuffled into Stiles room, shedding his shirt as he did so. “And I've known the fucker for years.”

 

“'S not my fault none of you can manage anything harder than Alexander around here.” Stiles didn't sound annoyed, but resigned, and he turned to raise an eyebrow at Jackson who stared back as he climbed into Stiles' bed. “I've got phone calls to make, so please, keep the sloppy make outs to a minimum.”

 

“Hilarious.”

 

“I'm the funniest in this pack, anyone and everyone knows that.” He called his dad first, getting his voicemail, and hanging up. His dad would see he called, and they could play another round of phone tag.

 

Braeden, however, picked up after two rings, with a brisk “The Guild are a _pain_ to negotiate with. It's shocking how high and mighty they are when the Brotherhood has far more standing. Not even like, as assassins, we're simply at better standing for information, so I don't know why Allison insists on going through this.”

 

“So, it's not going well.” Stiles chuckled, rooting around for his laptop.

 

“Went fine for me, but like I said, the Brotherhood isn't to be fucked with, and they know that. I gotta know why they think fucking with the Dawnguard would be a _better_ idea, but. Mallory has a broken nose from mouthing off to Allison.”

 

“Ha! I wish I could have seen that.”

 

“Oh, really.” Braeden paused, as if she were considering something, and Stiles hated not being able to see her face. Even if her face didn't give away any of what she was feeling, Braeden could never help herself. She'd give a half smirk and Stiles would scowl.

 

She was always messing with him.

 

“I don't really _hate_ Riften, but I have better things I'd rather be doing. So, we're switching. Bring Scott for werewolf back up.”

 

“What the fuck.”

 

“Stiles, I have way better things I could be doing than faux negotiating with the fucking Thieves Guild. Have you progressed any further with the fae issue?”

 

Stiles winced. A lot of his focus had been on Derek, he could admit that. “Nothing... concrete, yet.”

 

“Alright, well, I can handle that just as well as you can. Better, probably.”

 

“I got a A- in alchemy, you know that? I showed you the grades I got. High honors. Super high honors.”

 

“Your enchanting couldn't be saved by Akatosh himself.”

 

“I'm a scholar, not a journeyman.”

 

Braeden chuckled, obvious affection in her voice. Stiles probably learned more about alchemy from Braeden than he did at the College. “I'm just saying. I can take care of the fae, you can come here and do your scary altmer thing.”

 

“Wait--”

 

“Oh, no no no, I just called to make it clear to you. I already cleared things with Lydia; you just have to get Scott together, grab your makeup kit and your tickets. I'm coming back.”

 

“Braeden, really?” Stiles rubbed a hand over his face. “Really, _really_?”

 

“Really really. I know you have a lot to do, and a lot is going on, but this treaty has saved our asses too many times to be taken lightly. We're the only pack in league with them, and we can't just brush them aside because Derek is back. We don't even know how he's doing.”

 

“He's alright. Shifted back, but he's not awake yet.”

 

“And that's fine. Nurse him back to health, but you gotta get down here in a few days. I'll email you some of the new clauses for you to look over. Allison is staying because she has Dawnguard stuff to hash out with them, but we could really use you and Scott.”

 

Stiles groaned. “Whatever.”

 

“You know you're my favorite.”

 

“ _Whatever._ ”

 

“See you soon.”

 

Braeden hung up and Stiles groaned again, much to the amusement of the two wolves who were snuggling on his bed. Jackson would probably chuff if Stiles said that's what they were doing, but it _was_. Werewolves were tactile and emotional, and pretending otherwise didn't do anything for anyone.

 

But they made a sight, the two of them. Jackson was tucked up under Cora's chin, his eyes shut and obviously dozing as Cora carded her fingers through his short hair. Stiles' poor bed would be absolutely covered in strands of Cora's long hair, and yet he couldn't bring himself to shoo the two of them out of his room or get Cora to tie up her hair.

 

Stiles wasn't a wolf, but he was pack, and the warm, contentment from happy wolves – happy pack – was something he could feel, down to his bones.

 

Later that evening, Scott hadn't shifted, but he was leaping tree to tree, and Stiles could hear branches crunching under Scott's clawed grip. Stiles walked along behind him, shuffling stiffly from the chilly night air as he scrolled through the key points that Braeden asked him to look over. Stiles didn't know if there was a change in leadership or if Mercer got into his head that the pack not having an alpha was a pack that couldn't handle themselves, but either way, he was about to learn something new about them.

 

Scott wouldn't admit it, but Stiles knew he was still feeling pent up, which is why he left Scott to throw himself from tree to tree.

 

Braeden's notes weren't the most coherent thing Stiles has ever read, mostly made up of bolded outrage, enraged side notes, and snide comments. Stiles couldn't help but smile, swiping to bring up the keypad.

 

“I don't actually speak or read Dwemer, Stiles.” Braeden started conversationally when she answered her phone.

 

“I wasn't expecting you to, Scott just ran off into the distance and I'm lonely.”

 

“Yeah? Derek not awake yet?”

 

“Nope,” Stiles replied, with a hard popping p. “How would Derek being awake make me less lonely? Don't I have enough to deal with?”

 

“Oh, poor baby. Doing what you love and loving what you do.”

 

Stiles made a small noise of annoyance. For someone who showed up mid junior year and knocked all of them on their asses with just how _competent_ she was, Braeden knew Stiles entirely too well.

 

Stiles shook his head softly and looked forward, seeing the stone construct glowing in the dark, the base of it still dotted with the red nirnroot. He summoned magelight to his hand, but instead of casting it, he simply held the light in his hand, and leaned forward to exam the construct closer.

 

“Wait, let me switch so you can see it too.” Stiles hung up right after that, switching apps until Braeden could see the stone piece herself.

 

“It's obviously dwemer, you're right about that. Bring the camera closer.”

 

Stiles did as she asked, holding the light so Braeden could muse over the lettering that dotted the golden half sphere that sat atop the stone column.

 

“I hate it when you're right. I'm going to have to be there to get some prints of what's on there to be able to even have a chance at translating this, and that's assuming the notes I have are even correct.” Braeden heaved a sigh, and Stiles brought the camera up to face him again. “Don't you know any Mer at the College who know anything about the Dwemer?”

 

“Nah, the Dwemer were kind of... I don't know. The College has never been interested in the Dwemer beyond some of the more practical magic they used for their constructs or their subtle spells that keep people away from the deeper ruins.”

 

“Yeah, besides the the giant steam powered monsters in there.”

 

Stiles snorted his agreement, and clicked a few pictures under the magelight for him to look at later. “I'll make a few calls to see if anyone knows anyone who gives a shit about the Dwemer.”

 

“Sounds good. I should be home tomorrow afternoon, then you and Scott really gotta get going. Have you got tickets yet?”

 

“I haven't even eaten dinner yet.”

 

“I didn't know I had to baby sit you.” Braeden looked nonplussed, and then a little concerned. “Where's Scott?”

 

“Over here!” Scott shouted from somewhere out in the woods.

 

“Scott is being a puppy.” Stiles replied, as Scott skidded to a stop next to him, half shifted into his _glabro_ form.

 

“Don't be upset that Scott has more energy than you on your best days.”

 

“That's just factually incorrect.” Stiles held out his phone for Scott to take.

 

“Did you need me for something?”

 

“Yes. I'll be back tomorrow, but Stiles is doing the Stiles thing where he isn't really taking care of himself.”

 

“I can usually get him to sleep,” Scott said, turning and fixing Stiles with a less than impressed stare. Stiles was sick of that stare, coming from everyone. He was extremely impressive, alright? “But he's been touch and go since Derek got here.”

 

“Of course.”

 

“I'm standing right fucking here.” Stiles' tone was peevish, and Scott and Braeden gave him identical looks. “I'll eat when we get back and buy the tickets. Anything else?”

 

Braeden hummed noncommittally. “Nothing. You need a break, Stiles.”

 

“I'm fine. Go sleep, I know you're sick of my face.”

 

“...Mhm. Good night, guys.”

 

Stiles pressed end, and turned to  frown at Scott, who appeared to be calming down and shifting back. “You know what would be cool?”

 

“Take out Thai? Take out Thai sounds really cool right now.”

 

“No, I'd really like it if you guys would stop going behind my back and--”

 

“And what?” Scott opened his arms, eyebrows raised and lips pursed. “And do what, really? Make sure you eat and get daily calories? Sleep more than three hours a night? Not get fucked over by Derek again?”

 

“It's not your job to worry about _me_ , dude. I mean... I've got my shit together now. Stable job that I actually like, making money, my own house? Nothing to worry about.”

 

"Yo algún estaría preocupado por ti aunque te cuidadas perfectamente.” Stiles heaved a sigh as Scott started back towards the house. “Cuál no lo haces, así que no me estoy preocupando por ninguna razón, cabrón." 

 

“All I got out of that was that you called me a fucker.” Stiles started following, throwing his arms up over his head.

 

“Good. That was the important part, anyway.”


	6. anybody wanna buy a heart?

Kira Yukimura would be Kira McCall soon, whenever the two of them actually decided to start working on their wedding. The glowing couple hadn't done much since Scott put a ring on her finger, (Stiles remembered the day well. Scott still owed him for the light show he put on.) but they did still float around in engaged bliss.

 

It would be revolting to anyone who wasn't around for their entire relationship. But, as it were, Stiles happened to be around for the gross beginnings of their sweet summer romance, so he was immune.

 

The engagement ring made him grin, actually. The aforementioned illusions he casted aside, there was music and flower and Gods, Scott was romantic to almost a gross point.

 

He was also happy, and that's what was key.

 

Kira was just as bad as Scott was, of course, they wouldn't work so well if she wasn't. So when Stiles woke up far earlier than he wanted to (four hours, in your face, Scott) and found Kira in the kitchen, blissfully silent as she bustled around.

 

“Go back to sleep, Stiles.” Kira said, casting him a critical glance.

 

“Coffee.”

 

“Sleep.”

 

Stiles shuffled over to the coffee machine, groaning and whining when Kira pressed her palm into his chest, keeping him away from blissful peace in the form of over creamed coffee. He whined as Kira shooed him away as well, rolling her eyes as the whining continued.

 

“You don't need to be awake.”

 

“Oh dude, no, I have so fucking much I should be doing--”

 

“You won't get anything done if you're too tired to move.”

 

“I'm fine.”

 

“Then you can help me make lunches.”

 

Stiles nodded and moved to wash his hands, letting silence over take the two of them again. Kira had set out a bunch of little boxes, all already filled with rice and omelets. It was rare that Kira made lunches for everyone, and her lunch boxes were truly _the best._

 

“One of these is for me, right?”

 

“Are you going to go back to sleep?”

 

“If I say yes, can I have one?”

 

“If you go to _sleep_ you can have one. Or clean the shrimp.”

 

Stiles grumbled under his breath, picking up a knife to do as she asked.

 

“So, what is it exactly that you have that's 'so much'? You're barely at the store now, we should probably hire someone new.”

 

Stiles clicked his tongue. “Research, mostly. Halloween is coming up in like three weeks, so I've been getting lots of calls lately, which often involves more research. I started doing shipping, so I spend more of my time slicing my fingers off on cardboard, and more time on creating things to ship. It's like being back in College again only instead of being a TA, I'm the professor and I don't have time to wipe my own ass.”

 

“And you do this from the comfort of a metal chair in the med bay?”

 

“Oh my god,” Stiles huffed, half tempted to go back to sleep to avoid this. He wasn't down there all the time. In fact, he didn't high tail it straight downstairs upon waking up spoke volumes, in his opinion. So what if he sat with Derek for two hours last night before bed? He'd do the same for anyone in his pack.

 

“I'm awful for giving a shit about my ex, aren't I? It's almost like we were planning a life together and it all went straight to hell and I can't let it go completely.”

 

Kira cast a neutral look towards him, shaking her head softly.

 

“What?”

 

Kira nodded to the pile of shrimp that still needed to be cut, and Stiles stared back at her.

 

“No, really, what was that for?”

 

“I'm not going to be sorry for wanting an explanation.”

 

Stiles turned back to the pile of shrimp before setting his knife down. “I just really don't get it. I get that I'm wishy washy about Derek, but I think I'm allowed to be? It's not like I openly talk about it, you guys just keep bringing it up and expecting answers when I don't have to answer shit, really.”

 

Kira, for her part, didn't look startled at all by what Stiles said, but instead picked up his knife and worked on the shrimp herself. Kira was sweet and soft to Stiles, nearly always. Lydia made sure his store (and himself) was running at peak capacity, Allison reveled in, and fed his paranoia, on top of keeping him on his toes, and Braeden drove him to do better and be better, and was always quick to say “Spite can always be a reason.”

 

Kira was soft and warm, and her and Scott made Stiles soft and warm even if he didn't want to be. Kira in particular tutted over him in ways he didn't always pay attention to and probably took for granted.

 

“No one said you owed us anything,” Kira said after a moment passed. “But if you think seeing Derek hurt sucks, you could stop and think about how seeing you hurt feels to us.”

 

And because Scott is Scott and Scott has _amazing_ timing always, the man in question stumbled down the stairs and stalked into the kitchen, eyes bleary and red. He took in the scene before him, eyes flicking from Kira to Stiles and back again before he crossed the space between them and kissed Kira's cheek.

 

“Es muy temprano para esta mierda.” Scott straightened up, giving Stiles an appraising look. “Stiles, duérmate.” 

 

“I can't translate Spanish when I've _had_ coffee, buddy. You're going to have to run that one by me again.”

 

“Es muy temprano para el inglés, también. Go to bed.” 

 

Stiles, having been finished with the conversation since Kira mentioned the med bay, nodded and took Scott's head scruff for the affection that it was before heading back upstairs.

  


The Nogitsune always called Stiles by his full name, _Stilevarion Mieszko,_ in an accent that Stiles couldn't always understand. It stole his face, (pale, with dark under eye bags and an eternal smirk) but it appeared to him with floppy fox ears and six tails that flicked when it spoke. When it spoke, bubbles poured from its mouth, and popped with the words it was speaking.

 

It visited him in between terrorizing his pack.

 

Stiles was always underwater, when the Nogitsune consumed him. He couldn't breathe, no, but he didn't have to. He felt as though he was treading in one place. He didn't need anything. He didn't _want_ anything. He just.

 

Existed.

 

He watched everything, _everything_ , with a front row seat that roared in his ears. He could feel what the Nogitsune was doing, at times, when Stiles' power erupted from his hands in ways that Stiles himself couldn't muster when he was on his own.

 

It was destruction magic and the Nogitsune seemed taken with fire. Stiles found himself watching with morbid fascination when he was done screaming himself raw.

 

Fire was all consuming; it took and never gave back, it destroyed, it ruined, and for a being obsessed with the ideals of cold logic and airy riddles, Stiles didn't understand why fire was his weapon of choice.

 

But it sure was a reason for Stiles, fully in control and aware, to only clutch ice to defend himself.

 

Stiles woke, shaking and not any more rested than he was when he had first laid down. It had been awhile since his last dream about the Nogitsune– it felt like a near lifetime ago at this point– and it was on the more mild scale of things.

 

He never talked to anyone about the Nogitsune. Ever. He kept it to himself, his own private horrors that he carried with himself as he poured over books and spells and recipes. It was something that burned in his chest, that feeling of helplessness. He couldn't stop what he was doing, but he was fascinated by it.

 

He really made himself sick sometimes.

 

Back then, he was seventeen, and could hold a healing spell in his hands, and sparks on his fingertips. But the Nogitsune took his power, magic he knew that he had in his veins, and let the town burn.

 

At the time, Stiles _wished_ he had the power and control to do what Nogitsune did. It was intoxicating to hold that kind of magic in his hands, to cast it without worrying, to twitch his fingers and let his control waver for a moment before pulling it back with ease.

 

His control.

 

He rubbed his wrist and rolled out of bed, a curse on his lips and tried not to think about the fact that he'd only had this body for about seven years. It was missing a few scars from his childhood-- it was missing most of his scars from before, but that's because it wasn't the body he was born with. Sometimes he looked in the mirror and felt his breath catch in his throat. This was him now, it had been him for awhile but.

 

He tried not to think about it.

 

It was ten am now; he'd managed another three hours of worthless faux sleep that didn't do anything for his exhaustion or mood. His room was empty, expected, as he closed his door when he went back to bed.

 

He did feel a little lonesome.

 

Stiles ripped his sheets off his bed, tossing them in the low basket near the foot of his bed, along with his pillowcases, and after a pause of thought, he tugged off his shirt and sleep pants as well.

 

When he got downstairs, he stopped in front of the schedule board, to see if anyone had actually written down where they were for the day. Scott was with Deaton, Kira, Lydia and Jackson were all at work, while Danny and Isaac couldn't be fucked to write down where they were, apparently. Which basically left Derek's pack unaccounted for.

 

Erica and Boyd could be in a variety of places, but Stiles very much doubted they would stray far from their Alpha. Cora didn't seem to remember much about Beacon Hills, as she had been away from it so long, so Stiles supposed she was probably in the med bay, watching Derek.

 

He dumped his laundry off for a hot wash and went back upstairs for a change of clothes before walking back down to the med bay, where Cora, predictably, was.

 

“Any change since last night?” Stiles asked, immediately going to check Derek's vitals.

 

“I think he might wake up today, actually. His energy feels better today.” Cora gave a gentle smile, like she knew a secret. “Are you going somewhere?”

 

“I have some stuff I have to get at the mall,” Stiles started cautiously, knowing perfectly well that he would be going to Sephora. “And then it's my turn for general food shopping, and by the time I'm done with that cash drop from hell, Braeden should be back, and she's not... super impressed with me right now. You should see the twin judgment stares I get from Scott and Braeden sometimes, and I don't deserve it. I think I'm pretty exceptional, thank you very much.”

 

Cora's brows furrowed in a very Hale like manner and Stiles snorted. “Can I come with you?”

 

“Food shopping is boring.”

 

“So is staying cooped up here all the time.”

 

Stiles chewed his lip. Derek's pack had really just been lurking around for the last ten or so days, waiting with wringing hands to see if their Alpha would wake. At this point, it was obvious that he would; color had returned to his skin, slow, pained breaths came easier, and his exhausted body had healed up again. Stiles agreed with Cora, Derek would probably wake up in the next day or two. He nodded slowly.

 

“Yeah, okay. You're right.”

 

Cora, Stiles decided, needed some more clothes. He wasn't going to help her with that process, seeing as he already had more than enough to do, and he could already tell that Cora would take _forever._

 

“You know Cora,” Stiles pulled sunglasses off his dashboard and popped them on his face before peeling out of the driveway. “I still don't know terribly much about you. All you've really said is that your Derek's long lost sister, you like an unreasonable amount of maple syrup on your pancakes, you enjoy making flower crowns, and you're better at threatening people than Derek is.”

 

Stiles also knew that Cora played the same eyebrow talking game that Derek did, and she looked an alarming bit like Derek in the moment. She was even wearing his oversized shirt as something like a dress and leggings borrowed from Allison's side of Braeden's closet.

 

“What did you want to know?”

 

“I mean... whatever you want to tell me? I already knew Erica and Boyd enough, and you know I know Derek.”

 

Cora quirked a smile. “So you do. But, that's what getting to know each other is like, isn't it? I don't really know you either, Stiles. I don't even know your name.”

 

“Stiles _is_ my name.”

 

“A nickname.”

 

“It's what I want to be called. When I was younger, I couldn't... really pronounce my given name.” Stiles grinned a little at the memory. In retrospect, it wasn't _that_ hard, just othering that his name was so obviously Elven, but no one in his class would pick up on that. So, then his father had his records show his middle name instead, which wasn't any better. So, Stiles. “So it stuck. Stiles.”

 

Cora hummed, as if in thought, before shrugging. “That's fair. I assume you want to know my auspice?”

 

“I'm just nosy like that.”

 

“Theurge. Born under the sickle shaped crescent moon.”

 

“So you're like a mystic.”

 

“The closest thing Garou have to magic users.”

 

Stiles tsked. “Wolves can't use magic, though? I thought that was a well known fact.”

 

“Who said anything about the arcane arts? Theurge don't need a spell book to use magic. We're the closest to nature.”

 

“Which is something, considering most of you look like you want to quit humanity and live in the woods.”

 

That brought a chuckle of amusement from Cora, who nodded as well. “To be fair to Garou, humanity is a fuckin' tragedy.”

 

“I've been the tag along human of this pack since I was like what, sixteen? Wolves are no better with the over-reactive drama.”

 

“Fair. But that's what I am. Less of a magic user... more of a priestess? It's hard to describe to a human.”

 

“Like Kikyo, got it.”

 

“Kikyo?”

 

“I went through an Inuyasha phase in middle school.” Siles replied sheepishly. “She’s a priestess.”

Cora raised an eyebrow that Stiles had seen entire too many times, and took his phone to commandeer the use of the aux cable. “It’s sort of like that. The theurge can interact with the spirit world and oblivion a lot easier than most. We’re also gifted with the wisdom of Gaia, and have a lot of protection against supernatural threats.”

 

“Can you purify things? Kikyo could purify things.”

 

Cora tilted her head. “I’ve never tried it. I’ve spoken to a Daedric Prince before, that was cool.”

 

Stiles whistled low and long. That _was_ pretty fuckin’ cool.

 

What constituted for a mall in Beacon Hills was more of a long hallway with ever rotating set up of stores, restaurants and maybe three salons. The restaurant that had _always_ (and Stiles does mean always, he worked there when he was a teenager) been there is Red Lobster, and Cora turned her nose up at it as they walked by.

 

Stiles wanted to leave her to her own devices and to wander the mall, but once they got past Red Lobster, she fell in step behind him, seemingly following him as he scuttled around Sephora, casting forlorn glances at the store. They weren't really subtle glances either, and it's not that he thought Cora would _judge_ him for going into Sephora, it's just that he didn't really want to answer the questions related to him going in there to her.

 

At least, not for a while.

 

But she must have seen his pining at some point between rue21 and Cinnabon, because she sipped at her sugary monstrosity and took his hand to lead him into the store.

 

Stiles already knew what he wanted, or more specifically, what he needed to replace in the make-up kit that was crammed under his bed. It wasn't going to be _terribly_ pricey, unlike the first time he stocked the Merbox with Lydia's requested (demanded) items. A golden foundation, he needed to replace his eyeliner and black eyeshadow, and needed a new contouring brush. He was quick, and ready to pay and get _out_ when he saw Cora already holding a full bag of items, and another bag on her arm, half way full. He walked over to her, chewing his lip softly.

 

“What... what cha got there?”

 

Cora didn't stop running a tester eye pencil over her wrist, admiring the color. “Derek doesn't get attached to personal possessions and for some reason, he thinks I'm the same way, so after he found me, he didn't let me keep a lot with me. We were moving around so much that it didn't really matter.”

 

“Uh huh.”

 

“So, when we settled in Winterhold, and it seemed like we would be staying, or at least going to be staying for a while, Erica and I started building up our makeup collections again.”

 

“Uh huh.”

 

Cora turned to give him a _look_ , before glancing at the items in his hands before continuing. “And then, of course, Derek got abducted, so we ditched everything to find him. Now we're back here, Erica's pregnant and you know what? I'm not leaving Beacon Hills, and if I do, I'm coming back here, and if you chill out and let me look for some brow pencils, I'll pay for yours, too.”

 

Stiles huffed a half laugh, arms folded as Cora tossed her hair and continued on down the rows of gleaming products. “That's not what I thought you were going to say.”

 

“When we walked in, I remembered that I still have Derek's credit card. And since it also has my name on it? Well.”

 

Stiles shook his head, snorting. “I thought you would buy clothes first.”

 

“You have to take me to Beacon Heights for that.”

 

Talking to Cora was easy and natural, since she was chatty if Stiles picked a topic that she cared about. They talked about magic a lot, even if Stiles clearly drew lines about his time at the College. He didn't talk about his time at the College except in the vaguest terms, and then only on his terms. But,\ Cora was curious about illusions and alchemy, both of which Stiles was happy to talk about.

 

Stiles had a lot on his mind, and for awhile he had his phone unlocked, typing up lists of the various projects he had lined up, and answering emails. He kept going like that while Cora stocked up, asking Stiles every so often what he thought of a lip color. Sadly for her, he didn't think very much about lipcolors, as the extent of his lip knowledge was an ever changing tube of chapstick in his pocket or bag.

 

Stiles couldn't look at what the price for everything rung up as. He tuned out the sales woman as well, just focusing on the black card in Cora's hand, wondering when the fuck Derek Hale got a black card.

 

“That said, there's no good reason to go to Starbucks.” Cora's explanation was thorough, and Stiles found himself agreeing. After spending so much time in a locally owned coffee shop, _who baked their own bread_ , Stiles could only bring himself to wander into a Starbucks for green tea.

 

“And those peach green tea things you like? Just get boba instead.” Cora smoothed out her brows in the mirror and Stiles snorted.

 

“If you weren't a wolf, I would be worried about your teeth and blood sugar.”

 

“I'm not!” Cora's voice was a sweet sing song, and when she asked that Stiles waited a moment while she applied her new lipstick, he did.

 

Braeden was home by the time Cora and Stiles returned from abusing Derek's credit card.

 

“You guys ran out faster because we're here, right?” Cora had said, swiping Derek's card while Stiles laughed. “It's on Derek, he eats  like he's still going through puberty anyway.”

 

Braeden was waiting outside when they got back, offering to help unload the jeep while Cora swept away downstairs.

 

“You would think the werewolf with super strength would be up to helping, but nope.”

 

Food was unloaded, the two deep freezers restocked along with the cabinets and fridge. He and Braeden chatted as they put everything away, as Stiles had a few questions on what he would be dealing with when he got to Riften, and Braeden needed to be updated about the fae.

 

“I think finding a cause would be the best thing to do here but--” Braeden let out a sigh, from her seat at Stiles' desk.

 

“We have no leads and and nowhere to start.” Stiles huffed, bending down to pull clean jeans from his fresh laundry to be folded and tossed into his suitcase.

 

“I might have to take a closer look at the spore itself. I'll have to get a sample.”

 

“The fae have always been nice. Just ask.”

 

Braeden nodded. “Anything else I should worry about while you're gone?”

 

“Trying to get rid of me?”

 

“White boys are headache inducing,” Braeden replied primly. “It's why Scott is my favorite.”

 

“Okay, I don't want to be that guy-”

 

“But you're going to power through it, right?”

 

“That's not what you said last night!” Stiles hooted, narrowly avoiding Braeden's fist.

 

“You _incredible_ fucking weenie.”

 

Stiles smiled winningly, posed to snark back, when Scott burst in, frantically waving at Stiles. He wasn't shifted completely, but his hands were clawed, his eyes were glowing and he was looking a little furry around the edges.

 

Thankfully, he also didn't look like he was frenzying, but Stiles lifted his hands, nudging Braeden to do the same.

 

“Scott...” Stiles started, slow and clear. “Is there a problem?”

 

“I'm not frenzying,” Scott ground out around his fangs. “But Derek might be.”

 

“Fuck. Where's Cora?” Stiles snapped out, following Scott out of his room and towards the med bay.

 

“Cora and Erica are the only ones he'll let near him right now.”

 

“So, you want to send me down there?” Stiles stopped at the door to the basement, eyes narrowed at Scott.

 

Scott had calmed down slightly, claws retracting back into his fingers and straightening up from being hunched over. He was still tense though, and Stiles was feeding off that.

 

“Weird how you think I'm making you do anything.” Scott said after a beat, folding his arms. “You can do what you'd like about it; he growled and snapped at me and Boyd, and almost fought Jackson. They're in the den, and I have to handle that.”

 

“Help out with that, B, please,” Stiles asked, gripping the doorknob. Braeden nodded and followed Scott back out to the den, leaving Stiles to descend the staircase to the basement warily.

 

The workshop was fine when Stiles got down there, but the black door that lead to the medbay was open. It was quiet, a fine string of tension in the air, but he could hear Cora's low voice, speaking a language that Stiles couldn't understand. He nudged the door the rest of the way open and raised an eyebrow at the mess.

 

It wasn't as bad as he had built it up to be in his mind; he had envisioned thrown tables, strewn equipment, and Derek stalking back and forth like a wild beast. Instead, he was met with the cot he was on turned onto its side, and Derek, completely human, sitting up and alert behind it. Erica was sitting next to him, leaning against his side, eyes shut. His corner of the room looked like it had been tossed around and pawed through, but it wasn't anything that wasn't fixable or replaceable.

 

“Stiles, don't move.” Cora said, not turning away from Derek, who's eyes flicked up to glare at Stiles. “He's feral.”

 

Stiles swallowed. He'd never dealt with a feral werewolf who didn't need to be put down immediately; his experiences were with frenzying wolves and how to pull them out of that. Feral and not particularly dangerous was new, though.

 

“Shouldn't we be worried about that?” Stiles replied, holding his hands up, palms facing the wolves. Derek didn't look bothered. “He doesn't seem... feral?”

 

“Derek has exceptionally strong control over his wolf,” Cora explained, her tone fond. “And his wolf, just like anyone else's, is controlled by his id. But since he has such a strong hold over his wolf...”

 

“Feral doesn't mean out of control, for him.” Stiles mused, coming a little closer.

 

“No, but it does mean we'll have to treat him like a wolf for awhile. He's all instinct right now.” Derek huffed, and Cora reached out over the cot for Derek to rub his cheek against her hand. “I should have known that this would happen – when we got him out, one of the Thalmor slammed Erica into a wall, and he shifted into _Crinos_.”

 

Stiles winced. Crinos was the werewolves’ war-form, or as Stiles has called it, the “nine foot tall snarling death beast”. The Crinos form was called a wolf's war-form because that's what it was meant for. War. Destroying. It reduced a wolf's mind to a single track, and it was always death.

 

“Was he like that for long?”

 

“Long enough that I should have considered that it would take him time to return to normal, and he might have to turn feral for a while to cope with it.”

 

“Do you think he'll eat me if I check him out?”

 

Cora snarled, not at Stiles exactly, just in general, then turned to catch Derek's attention again. Derek looked coherent to Stiles, just sort of growl-y and not interested in speaking. Stiles could see coiled lines of muscle flexing under his clothes, as if he were ready to pounce at any moment. With Erica so close to him and Cora nearby, Stiles supposed he felt as though they needed protection. He personally didn't think so – after all, Erica was the one who started and finished the fight between her and Jackson, and _won_ – but it seemed to soothe Derek, which is what they wanted.

 

“I don't know, Stiles,” Cora replied after letting the silence stretch. “Do werewolves eat humans?”

 

“No?”

 

“There's your answer then.”

 

For some reason, Stiles felt as though he'd been slapped. He grit his teeth and moved forward slowly, so as not to spook Derek, who had stopped paying attention to Cora, and now had eyes locked on him.

 

“Derek, I know you ripped your catheter out and stuff, so I can't just look at the monitors to check on you, so am I allowed to come over there?”

 

Cora rolled her eyes as Stiles pressed forward, his hands still up for Derek to see. Derek turned away from him to softly push Erica to wakefulness, a clear showing of dominance, and care for Erica. Stiles wasn't insulted – Derek _was_ an alpha, even if he wasn't Stiles' alpha.

 

Stiles kept his hands up, prematurely letting the red of a healing spell leak through his fingers. After Derek looked back over at him, the reaction was nearly instant. Derek's shoulder slammed into Stiles' gut before he could defend himself, air flying out of his lungs like a bullet. He hit the ground hard, just barely able to keep his head from snapping back and slamming against the hard tile of the med bay. His eyes cracked open slightly, already narrowed tightly at Derek who snarled at him, his face twisted in fury and fear.

 

Right. Magic. Thalmor.

 

It was a dumb move, but it was almost second nature at this point to reach out with healing hands to someone in pain. But Derek's wolf said attack, and the magic coursing through Stiles' veins was screaming to fight back, and he _couldn't_ , not without hurting Derek and possibly putting him back on that cot for another week.

 

“Derek.” Stiles' voice was slow and steady. He'd dealt with frenzy before, handling Derek's wolf wouldn't be that much different, would it?

 

“Stiles, watch yourself,” Cora said, not rising from where she was sitting, but keeping her eyes trained on the two of them. “He's not himself.”

 

Stiles didn't agree, but he kept his eyes on Derek, catching his gaze before looking away slowly, tilting his neck up for Derek to look at instead. It was submission, which he rarely did for a wolf since leaving the College. But Derek could easily rip his throat out for his previous threat, and it _was_  Derek.

 

Stiles swallowed, shutting his eyes as Derek brought his face closer, obviously sniffing, his already tenuous relationship with personal space at all time low. Derek sniffed and snuffled at his chest and neck, his expression changing easily from wary, to confused, to what looked like offense to Stiles, which then offended Stiles.

 

He smelled great, and according to Scott, he smelled like _magic._ Nothing could be better.

 

Except maybe to Derek, who was looking a little hairier and somehow angrier, and Stiles' mouth started running before he could help himself.

 

“Derek, please,” Stiles started, yanking his arms out from under Derek's legs and held them up again, half blocking his face, half so he could throw a spell if he needed to. “Derek, I'm not going to do anything. Can you even hear me? I know I look weird to you right now, and I probably smell super fucking weird, but that's what I always smell like. You've smelt it before, it used to be on your skin before and it was mine. I used to smell like you too, and right now I probably smell a lot like Scott, just like, I don't know, come down here and smell closer, I smell like pack. I have Cora's scent on me, I've felt Erica's twins kick. Dude, Derek, it's me, fucking _Magnus_ \--”

 

Stiles heart stuttered for a moment before he reached up and grabbed Derek's shoulders and dragged him closer, Stiles' hands on Derek's face, and their foreheads touching. He was vulnerable like this, he knew that, but he also didn't have _any_ idea what he should do. Derek wasn't _in there_ to hear his heart stuttering in fear under his ribs, and Stiles barely knew how to appeal to his wolf besides scent, and Stiles was full of those.

 

“Babe?” Stiles said lowly, hoping Cora and Erica wouldn't hear him. “I'm not going to do anything. I just wanted you safe.”

 

Derek was uncomfortably close, forehead to forehead, nose to nose, and there was no way he didn't smell the fear that was beading on his skin, and the clear signs of submission.

 

“What's on your mind, big guy?” Stiles asked, keeping his voice down. Derek sighed deeply, but it didn't look to be from exasperation, it was as though he was letting out a held breath. He leaned forward until he could bury his face in Stiles' neck, and the wolf breathed in deeply, quietly, before letting out a wounded sound.

 

“Derek?”


	7. my heart belongs to someone who couldn't stay

Once upon a time, Derek Hale kissed Stiles Stilinski under the moon, Masser, standing on a cliff outside of Winterhold's College. Stiles' arms were around Derek's neck, Derek's hands were resting on the small of Stiles' back. Derek was dipping him backwards a bit, because Derek was far cheesier than anyone gave him credit for.

 

Stiles remembers this particular instance of Derek kissing quite vividly, the slide of his tongue, the way his usual mild voice, deepened into a growl, the way he tugged Stiles closer when Stiles licked into his mouth. The way that Derek's strength is always super obvious in his arms, and being held the was Derek held him was fucking addicting. He could go with feeling like this, trembling down past his knees as Derek set one last nip at Stiles' lips before trailing those lips down his neck.

 

Stiles blinked up at his ceiling, smacking his lips to clear his head. The last thing he felt like doing was getting aroused about a werewolf who had gotten back into touch with his wild side.

 

But it was also such a pleasant memory. He was wearing his his school robes because Derek had called him down from his room. Winterhold was cold, as it was, but that night it was such a calm and windless night, it was more of a silent cold. Derek had bought him a coffee and they sat by one of the warm fires in town, and just talked. Stiles had said he was graduating soon, Derek said he was looking settle down with his pack.

 

Stiles smiled at the memory. He agreed that he'd be Derek's emissary if Derek came back to Beacon Hills. They kept chatting about it, building and building – Stiles wanted a comic book story or an apothecary, Derek wanted to volunteer at the firehouse. Stiles had joked that maybe Derek could get Scott to be an alpha and Derek said he wouldn't make Scott do anything he didn't want to do.

 

They were kissing because Derek said let's kiss on it, Stiles had said he was tacky and cheesy, and instead stuck his hand out to shake on it. Derek used that arm to pull Stiles in, and lay a kiss that almost melted the snow around them.

 

Stiles played in Derek's wild hair, running his fingers through it, rubbing at Derek's scalp until the man's head knocked up a different area for Stiles to rub.

 

'This is how we're supposed to be,' Stiles thought, shutting his eyes. Curled up in bed together, warm and content, with no weird nonsense happening around them.

 

As it stood though, it was day two of Derek's feral regression.

 

After Derek had calmed down in the med bay, Stiles sent Cora and Erica to shoo everyone else out of the house, and brought Derek upstairs for a while to let him prowl around the house a bit, until he came upon Stiles' room and settled down in there. When Stiles didn't follow, Derek wordlessly herded him in.

 

“You're so lucky you can't use words right now,” Stiles grumbled, stripping down and settled in for a long cuddle.

 

He was entirely too tired to resist the lure of lounging in bed and taking care of Derek, dozing and sleeping without a problem now that Derek was back in his room. Derek's wolf brain was attached to Stiles in a way that Stiles couldn't – _wouldn't_ – examine too closely.

 

They parted on awful terms; Derek had made it painfully clear how he felt about Stiles and his fellow mages, malevolent, benevolent and benign.

 

That they were dangerous.

 

Unrivaled.

Without boundaries.  

 

Stiles grit his teeth. He didn't how they were going to come back from that, if he wanted to come back from that, even. Derek was clearly afraid of him, hated the mage that he was, and his magic was a _part_ of him, inherent to his very person just like Derek's wolf was.

 

Derek made a little sound under his breath, pressing closer to bury himself against Stiles' neck with a contented grumble.

 

Any anger Stiles had regarding what happened between them, that fight that had shattered the fragile peace they had built for themselves, it all sat on the back burner of his mind as he waited for Derek to regain his senses (they were sure he was going to, quickly too, considering how he was treating Stiles.)

 

His days were warm, a blanket of Derek plastered across his back or pressed into his side, sleeping deeply in a way he hadn't managed in the last few months.

 

He spent his days catching up with his reading, reading aloud to Derek when he was awake, warm skin pressed to his because it was too hot to keep much more than boxers on.

 

Cora delivered food periodically, letting Derek nuzzle her cheek and returning it with an amused chuckle.

 

But the sun rose and set three times, and those were Stiles' days. Spent reading passages out of his collection of books, eating hot meals every day with a hot body pressed to his side, and nothing hurt.

 

It wouldn't stick, eventually Derek would wake up and they would have to face each other and the things they said when they were angry, but for now, Stiles could read to Derek from his books about magic, and Derek could rub his bearded cheek against Stiles' neck and jaw.

 

“'When the Chimer first abandoned the herds and tents of their nomadic ancestors, and built the first Great Houses,” Stiles read as Derek ate a peach (Gods, he really would have to wash his sheets after this), “We loved the Daedra, and worshiped them as Gods. But our brethren, the Dwemer, scorned the Daedra, and mocked our foolish rituals, and preferred instead their gods of Reason and Logic.'”

 

Stiles closed the book and glanced at Derek who's pupils weren't as wide as they had been in past days. “I think what's hilarious about the Dwemer is that they used magic with their so called gods of Reason and Logic. Is it because Daedra are blood thirsty? Seems a little hypocritical of them, considering what they did to the Falmer.”

 

Derek looked a little more coherent as well, his eyes flicking out the window to see the dark sky.

 

“Go to sleep, Stiles.” Derek said, perfect and clear, and Stiles was tired enough to do it.

 

It had been four days, half a thousand day dreams, six books and two trays for the two of them when Stiles woke up, and Derek wasn't beside him. Derek was downstairs, tucked away with his pack in the den. Showered, dried, sitting up and chatting with them quietly, as though he didn't just spend four days scent marking Stiles all over his neck, cheeks and jaw.

 

But he was okay, so Stiles called Scott about catching a plane that evening, packed his bag up completely and took a shower, where he cried while the heat of his shower washed away the red of beard burn and the smell of Derek on his skin.


	8. and i'm always tired but never of you

“I don't understand why you like this place so much. Like, dude, no exaggeration, this place is nasty. Voted one of the top ten most dangerous cities on the East Coast, I mean, the _Thieves Guild's_ headquarters are here. Not that we're above that, apparently,” Stiles complained as they stopped at yet another food cart. Scott barely gave him a passing glance, and simply ordered yet _again_ more street food, this time enough for the two of them. “I'm just saying you should probably be less enthused about being here.”

 

Scott was ignoring him, which was obnoxious, because Stiles wasn't talking just for Scott to ignore him, but he took the bag of fritos Scott offered him, and dug into the mix of meat and sauces. “Oh holy shit.”

 

Scott nodded sagely, following as Stiles started walking down Riften's worn down streets. “I'll spend all my money on cart food, I honestly don't give a fuck. Cities are cool.”

 

“We're not tourists,” Stiles snarked back. “We have places to be. Shit to do.”

 

“Things to eat. Don't deprive me of this.”

 

Stiles laughed, low and soft, and tugged his hat lower over his years. It was chilly enough that it wasn't out of place for him to be wearing a beanie, but it was also Riften. No one gave a damn what someone else was doing as long as they weren't getting shanked. He'd still have to play up his features with the Guild, as always, but he didn't have to _hide_.

 

However, that didn't make Riften any less stank, depressing and outright awful in Stiles' opinion. Scott, however, loved Riften. Loved the food, loved the sights, loved the places he could visit – loved the fact that he could buy a new phone for half the usual price.

 

“You need a case for that,” Stiles murmured, eying the new phone Scott pulled out of his pocket. For someone who consistently whined about his and Braeden's ways of collecting information, Scott sure didn't seem to be worried about the truck that his new phone had obviously fallen of.

 

“I'm not gonna drop it yet.”

 

“Mhm. You'll just put it in your back pocket, where it'll crack, probably.”

 

Scott chuckled and continued on, his nose leading them to an outdoor market that was situated down town. It seemed a little like a farmer's market to Stiles, with booths and tents set up all over the area, with people shouting about their wares and customers bustling around. Stiles had asked Scott to find it because he was looking for an alchemist buy from.

 

“When are we meeting Allison?” Scott asked, trailing behind his soulmate.

 

“Coupla hours? She said she'd call, but probably this evening.” Stiles looked over the crowds of people. He had spotted a few weak illusion spells in the crowd – one casted by a Bosmer, two Dunmer and a mage with white eyes. He figured one of them would lead them to where he needed to be. This open market seemed almost devoid of magic.

 

“I'm gonna wander off and do some stuff,” Stiles held up his phone, waving it. “You're good by yourself, right?”

 

Scott chortled. “Out of you?”

 

Stiles gave a little wave and the finger as Scott waved back, grinning. “Don't get in trouble, dude.”

 

Riften was a gross hole. It was filled to the brim with shitty people doing shitty things, living shitty, and often times just trying to get by. But the entire town was under the thumb of the Thieves' Guild, which had changed slightly as the eras continued on. They mostly collected information for extortion and worked as the threats that kept politicians in line, and in years prior had worked as a group of almost Robin Hood-like vigilantes. That all ended with the rise of Mercer Frey.

 

Stiles had met with Mercer Frey plenty of times over the past five years, and while he was always in makeup to make him look like a natural born Altmer, Mercer and his second, Brynjolf, had always shown him the respect that was allotted to him as an Emissary. But Stiles was always uneasy about the easy way Mercer spoke to him, while completely ignoring Scott, who was the person Mercer should have shown the most respect to.

 

He often brushed it aside as his own overprotectiveness when it came to Scott, but the Guild simply weren't Stiles’ favorite people to treat with. Stiles got the vague feeling that the only reason that Mercer showed any sort of interest in treating with them had everything to do with Braeden's ties to the Dark Brotherhood.

 

If it was up to Stiles (and it might as well be), the pack would have _nothing_ to do with the Guild.

 

On the plus side, the Dawnguard, who were renowned, high caliber hunters, weren't looking for a treaty. Stiles would always say no – they would want information that Stiles wasn't willing to give. Allison as an in between worked out fine for their pack, and he assumed it would stay that way. Interacting with the Dawnguard was exhausting at the best of times, at the worst of times it was bloody and a test of his own morality.

 

“Watch what the fuck you're doing!”

 

The shrill voice brought Stiles back from his overthinking daze, making him shake his head to snap out of it. He'd managed to run into a young woman, probably no older than himself. She reminded him a bit of Cora, with her glare and how she held herself, back perfectly straight. Her hair was black though, and her eyes were blue, and she was covered in the milkshake that Stiles supposed he had jostled.

 

“I'm sorry!” Stiles said in a rush, pulling his bag off his shoulder to pull tissues out.

 

“Oh, fuck off,” The girl snapped, slapping the tissues out of Stiles' hand. “Do you have any idea how much this costs? Do you have any _fucking_ clue who I am?”

 

Stiles rolled his eyes, letting his outstretched hand fall. Any goodwill he had towards the girl had evaporated by the time she snapped her hands to her hips.

 

“I don't really care,” Stiles gave a half assed shrug, and turned to leave, intending to get away before the girl caused a scene. “Have a nice rest of your day.”

 

“Are you kidding me?” She fumed to Stiles' back as he kept walking. He put the mild annoyance to the back of his mind, he decided that finding an alchemist would be a better use of his time, and set out to do so. Fuck the Guild, having good connections between ingredient suppliers and alchemists was far more valuable.

 

After asking around with guarded questions. Stiles found himself in the city under the city – the docks of Riften. It was wooden and old, held up with barely sealed bricks, and Stiles wondered if it looked the same in past eras.

 

It was easy to see that the docks were where the magic of Riften was. Stiles felt as though the place was still held together by wisps of magic. Moss grew up the sides of building that were built into the foundation of the city, flowers blossoming off the vines that crawled up from the water. Between vines that seemed to have been cultivated to grow around the door, Stiles found exactly what he was looking for.

 

The shop was warm, a crackling fire to his right as he stepped in, the smell of drying herbs making him grin as he spotted the usual tell-tale signs of a magic dealer: a bush of potted deathbell. Mundanes shied away from the poisonous and misunderstood plant, but Stiles always thought the color was too striking to ignore.

 

A woman sat behind the wooden counter of the shop, her chin rested on her hand as she flipped through a large book. She was older than he was, probably early thirties, and while Stiles knew he was a skilled alchemist in his own right, he knew his talents laid in the arcane arts, not the arcane sciences. Having someone older than him, and most likely far more skilled than himself was always a boon. Contacts within the alchemic community meant that issues (such as the fae's issues) could have more minds put to work on it.

“Hey there,” Stiles started politely, walking up to the counter. The woman glanced up, dark eyes flashing as she pinned him with a glare.

 

A wolf, then.

 

“What can I help you with, elf?”

 

Stiles had long ago come to terms with the fact that all wolves were _obnoxiously_ good looking, and the woman was no exception. Her dark brown hair was straight but waved at the ends, obviously styled with loving care, her eyes were dark, but Stiles couldn't quite place if they were dark _brown_ or just an incredibly dark green.

 

The woman snapped her fingers. “I'm talking to you, elf. What do you want?”

 

Stiles grinned, letting the elf comment roll off his back. It wasn't as though she was _wrong_ , or had no reason to think so. Bretons typically had a slight point to their ears if their blood was potent. Stiles had the somewhat longer ears that were Mer typical. He wouldn't hold it against her, and it wasn't like it was an insult. Wolves had every right to hate Elves, particularly Altmer.

 

Why couldn't his mother had been one of the rare snow elves? That would have been cool.

 

“I just wanted to find out if you would be interested in some trading.” Stiles admitted. The woman already showed her hand by flashing her eyes. He would have to tread lightly with her.

 

She frowned. “What, you don't have any money?”

 

“That's-- no, I do, but that's not what I meant. I mean like shipments? Alchemist to alchemist. You need glow 'shrooms, I need cyrodilic spadetail. I know an excessive amount about kitsune, you--”

 

“Know a lot about the Garou.” she filled in, and Stiles grinned.

 

“I mean yeah, you are one. But, I'm an Emissary to a pack out west, so I already know an uncomfortable amount about werewolves.”

 

“I'm Amara.” she said, rising from her seat behind the counter. “I've never met an elven emissary.”

 

“Yeah, Mer tend to keep to themselves, but I'm a Breton.”

 

Amara tilted her head, long brown locks tossing like she was supposed to be on the cover a magazine. “You smell like an elf. They have high magic, so it's pretty easy to smell it. But your heart didn't skip, so you're telling the truth.”

 

“I'm a cornucopia of shit that doesn't make sense.” Stiles gave Amara a lopsided smile and smiled a bit brighter when Amara's lips quirked upwards as well.

 

Amara was gruff, guarded, and had three obviously werewolf children. Two showed up mid afternoon from school while Amara and Stiles talked, and a baby was upstairs. Amara would stop every so often to twitch her ears and listen for him.

 

The baby was cute, with warm toned skin that was lighter than his mother's, and big brown eyes that stared at Stiles with curiosity from his perch on his mother's hip. Her two other kids sprawled on the floor of the store in a corner, coloring, and eying Stiles with the same sort of curiosity that the baby did.

 

Amara was packless. Or rather, her pack was just her children and herself, and Stiles was a little confused about that. There was a pack in Riften; in fact, Riften's alpha, Niall, controlled a fair portion of it. He wouldn't push it though, not with their tentative agreement in place. Amara had her children, a business to run, and was a priestess of Gaia, and Stiles thought she was perfect. Their agreement would be simple and unwritten: he would provide ingredients and potions that were hard to come by in the Northeast. In return, Amara promised emergency shelter, and information on Riften's on goings whenever Stiles needed it. Their pack wasn't allied with Riften's pack, but they did have a non-aggression treaty in place that Stiles wasn't quite sure was going to last.

 

Stiles was rarely nice in his dealings with Riften's alpha, but they never got over their first impressions of each other. Stiles though he was a pompous fucklamp, and the alpha thought he was a childish know it all.

 

Amara, amusingly, agreed with Stiles.

 

“It's not even his fault, Riften just sucks.” Stiles said, bouncing Amara's youngest child on his lap. “No offense.”

 

Amara chuckled quietly. “None taken. This city was always doomed to be a cesspit. If it's not the Black-Briars openly cavorting with the Guild, it's our trash Mayor turning a blind eye to it all.”

 

Stiles snorted. “The Black-Briars?”

 

“Never had Black-Briar whiskey? They've been running Riften since the Fourth Era. They have their fingers in any pie they can get their hands on.” Amara's lip was curled into a snarl, and Stiles stopped bouncing the baby. “It's already exhausting enough not being human enough for the knuckle draggers in this town, but on top of that, the Black-Briars _know_ and they _hate_ the Garou. If Niall has been more of an ass clown than usual, I can bet you it has to do with the Black-Briars.”

 

“You make them sound ominous, but I assume you can't just go to the cops, right?”

 

“Yeah right. The Matriarch of the family is the issue, her little kids mean fuck all. But Maria Black-Briar hates Garou more than she hates not being in everyone's business. She's dangerous to people like us, she knows too much, and she has everyone right under her thumb.”

 

“Noted.”

 

“I'm serious, Stiles.” Amara had gotten worked up enough that her baby began fussing, but Stiles simply shifted him into a more comfortable position and tucked him closer to his neck. “I think one of the girls is the leader of the Guild's lover.”

 

“A dream team of fuckery, probably.”

 

Amara eyed him, eyes narrowed sharply. “I assume you've dealt with a lot, being a pack's Emissary, right?”

 

Stiles grinned; he could write books on 'how to be an emissary when you're not trained and you're all teenagers'. “I haven't been a proper emissary that long, actually, but I've been running with wolves for years. That might be why I don't get along with Niall. I mean – wait, were you there when we met?”

 

Amara shook her head slowly. “I steer clear of Niall when I can.”

 

“Right, well fuck him, honestly. He called my best friend a whelp and tried to get him to submit. Didn't work – Scott is the king of cheap shots.” Stiles let out an amused sounding breath at the memory. At the time, they had just come to Riften to meet with the Guild. Braeden had put together the idea of the treaty and it would be their first major treaty, and it would absolutely put them at high standing.

 

“Actually, I vaguely remember this. I wasn't there for it, but I know someone who was there.”

 

“Yeah, and then he decided to bitch me out for bringing Scott and how he was just _so_ insulted that I couldn't bring the alpha. Which Scott is, technically. I still don't know what Niall was expecting, but the only reason I didn't pan-sear his ass is because his emissary has more sense than him.”

 

Amara gave a puff of laugh in response. “Niall should have never became alpha.”

 

“I agree, and I also have to get going.” Stiles got to his feet, slowly moving the sleepy baby from his shoulder. The baby puffed as his mother did and Stiles stuck his tongue out. “You are just so stinkin' cute.”

 

“Before you go,” Amara started, rising to her feet. “Do not trust the Guild. Under Gallus, they were passable. They only bothered the rich, and Niall knew Gallus well. But he's been missing for years now, and Mercer is awful. He's why the Guild is in such disarray.”

 

Stiles paused. With how Amara was speaking, she obviously wanted to say more, but something was holding her back. He nodded, holding out her son for Amara to take.

 

“Have a good night, Amara.” He said, holding out his hand to shake hers, but she instead took his hand and rubbed her cheek against it. Stiles smiled. “See you tomorrow, probably!”

 

Amara's shop was on the lower docking area of Riften; almost another city within the city, where those deemed “undesirable” set up their shops and homes. It was awful, but Stiles wasn't surprised. The area was teeming with magic. Bretons, Elves and Wolves seemed to live quiet lives, away from those who didn't know of the veil.

 

Stiles still had time to kill before he had to meet up with Allison and Scott and head down to the Ragged Flagon for their meeting.  It was enough time to put on his make up and get in the right frame of mind for dealing with Mercer. Stiles generally dealt with Vex or Brynjolf, both of which treated him with the respect that was due to an Emissary. That aside, they were both no-nonsense types, which is what Stiles preferred when his serious face was on, and it had to do with pack.

 

Hopefully Mercer wouldn't insist on dragging the process out, Stiles had too much to deal with at home – Which is why Allison and Braeden were sent to Riften in the first place.

 

“Should've sent Lydia too,” Stiles muttered to himself, shoving his hands in his pockets as he dragged himself towards the termite infested staircase that would take him from the canals to Riften proper.

 

Before he could make it up even three steps, he paused. It was nearly silent, which was never a good sign. Before he could summon an orb of light to take a better look around, pain exploded at the back of his head; it was sharp, bright, and made his vision swim.

 

He fell to his knees, missing the railing and tumbling back down, slamming his head against old, creaky wood.

  


Stiles woke slowly, and realizing that he wasn’t safe, Scott’s lessons on waking up in a strange place sprung to mind: wake up with your nose. Smell what you could, try to get a feel of where you were. Feel the air on your skin, take stock of how your body is feeling. Stiles felt a little annoyed at the time of Scott telling him this, since he thought his days of kidnapping were behind him, barely more than nightmares of high school and a lack of control, but here he was.

Kidnapped.

Fuck.

He smelt the faint smell of, oh _god_ , fucking sewer juice, rotten, rancid, and he almost gagged from just the slightest whiff of it. He was cold, his head hurt, and his hands were tied behind his back. But he was sitting in a chair and his feet weren’t tied. He could get out of this, assuming there weren’t too many complications, but he wasn’t ready to open his eyes quite yet.

“Is he going to wake up any time soon?” a woman’s voice asked, sounding bored. “You said he had a pet, and I don’t want to get caught up with wolves.”

She said it like a curse, and Stiles grit his teeth to stay silent.

“His pet isn’t going to find him down here,” and that was Mercer’s voice, Stiles would recognize that slimy bastard’s voice anywhere. What on earth did Mercer want with him that he couldn’t just ask for like a normal goddamn person?

“There’s far too many smells down here for him to come sniffing. Do not worry yourself.”

Stiles snorted inwardly. The Guild had no other dealings with wolves besides his pack, and it was painfully obvious. Stiles felt the cold, tacky feeling of cooling blood on his face, which was a good thing. Scott could usually sniff out Stiles regardless of other scents, but if he could smell Stiles’ blood, he would come faster, and would find him easier, with Allison in tow, probably. He had to figure out what exactly Mercer wanted before Scott found him and threw Mercer into a wall, or something equally dramatic. You didn’t touch a member of Scott’s pack without serious payback, even if Scott would always be Scott and therefore wasn’t likely to kill anyone.

“I’m sick of this. Wake him the fuck up.”

Before Stiles could make a show of rousing himself, he was met with a backhand to the side of the face. His already throbbing skull was rattled again, making his stomach heave, and his idea to simply talk to Mercer melted away. He slowly opened his eyes, taking in his surroundings critically.

Oh, he was somewhere in the Cistern alright. A nameless Guild member stood before him, flanked by Mercer, who looked entirely too pleased with himself. Stiles sneered.

“You can’t be this shortsighted,” Stiles spat, Mercer’s calm infuriating him in an instant. “You just can’t. There’s no goddamn way that you lead the Guild and you’re this fuckin’ stupid. Kidnapping an emissary? Critically stupid.”

“You would assume so.” Mercer responded, dismissing his lacky with a pat to the shoulder as he strode forward and stood in front of Stiles. “You are not Dawnguard, and you are not Dark Brotherhood. You are, however, expendable, and I am more than willing to prove that.”

“What is that, is that a threat? You’re gonna kill me and can’t be fucked to tell me why?” Stiles tone was deceptively mild. “Couldn’t you just have waited until we were supposed to meet anyway instead of pilfering me off the street?”

“Drop the act,” came the same female voice from earlier. Stiles turned his gaze to the right to find the speaker, only to see the girl he had bumped into earlier in the day, dressed in the Guild’s uniform. “I’m onto you.”

“Oh really.” Stiles drawled in return. “This seems like a bit much for a spilled milkshake, don’t you think?”

“You’re no elf, Breton.”

“My parentage says otherwise, but yeah, sure, you’re onto me.”

“I will admit to being petty,” The girl went on, as if Stiles hadn’t spoken. He rolled his eyes. He was real sick of being ignored here. “But this has nothing to do with this morning, and everything to do with what you can do for the Guild and my family.”

“Our unsigned treaty? Yeah, you know the non-aggression one where we don’t rip you apart for being in our territory?” Stiles snarled. “You can fucking forget that at the rate you’re going.”

“Do you know what this is, boy?” Mercer asked, nonplussed. He held up a bronze looking… pin, Stiles guessed, with a glowing aqua colored orb atop it. It looked like a decorative stick to Stiles, and he squinted in confusion. It almost looked like the Eye of Magnus to him.

“Couldn’t tell ya.” Stiles decided to say instead. His hands were tied, but he could still cast spells, and frankly, he wanted to get out of here. “Why don’t you ask your assistant over there?”

The woman frowned severely, brow creasing. “Watch your tone.”

“Or? You gonna dump a milkshake on me? As long as it’s not strawberry, it’s whatever. Unless you get like organic milkshakes that have actual strawberries in them. I could dig that.”

The woman swore. “Or you find yourself on the business end of an assassin’s blade when this is all over.”

This girl could not be any easier to bait, Gods be praised. He snorted unkindly.

“What’re you gonna do? Hm? Murder some rando to get their heart just to murder lil ole me? Is this a pigtail pulling thing? Do you think I’m sexy? Is it the scruff? I told my alpha that it’s a chick magnet but he said I should stick to scruff if I _have_ to because my beard is patchy.”

The girl flushed, her cheeks blowing a furious scarlet. Either he was right, or she was going to pop a blood vessel.

“I respond better to coffee date invites, just fyi.” Stiles went on. “I can admit to being a slut for a good cup of coffee.”

“You should mind how you speak to a Black-Briar!”

Ah. So that was it then.

“Your beer tastes like toilet water and your whiskey is fucking swill.” Stiles said, matter of factly. “And better people have tried to get me killed, but feel free to add yourself to the list.”

One of the three uniformed Guild members hid a chuckle under a grunt, and Stiles smirked. He could manage five people, probably, but he needed to know what Mercer wanted before he did so. Baiting the Black-Briar girl appeared to be the easiest way to get what he wanted, and this kidnapping would be enough to have any further involvement with the Guild halted. It was like Christmas come early, assuming he didn’t get shot or something. Gunshot wounds were _murder_ to heal, and took a solid week, at fucking least, to heal up properly.

Assuming it didn’t kill him on impact.

“I’ll do it _myself_!” the girl fumed, catching Stiles’ drifting attention again. She was red faced and tense, but Stiles couldn’t bring himself to find her to be a threat. If Amara was correct, her _mother_ was the one to look out for. The three Black-Briar girls merely enjoyed the status their names brought them, while the one son seemed not to want anything to do with the family.

Stiles ignored her and nodded at Mercer, who looked fit to spit acid. He batted his eyelashes. “Where were we, Mercer?”

“What do you know about Crimson Nirnroot?”

“’Bout as much as I could know about something I’ve never heard of.”

“I’m having trouble believing you, my boy.”

“Why are you asking about something that doesn’t exist? Nirnroot is a light blue-green. I know you know this. You’ve bribed me with it before. And shit, any given alchemist could answer this dumbass question, same as I could.”

“Around here?” Mercer scoffed. “Even if I could brow beat that damned werewolf into providing knowledge, she doesn’t have your arcane expertise.”

“I don’t know or care about what you want, Mercer. You’re fucking up, my guy. Let me leave, we’ll dissolve our contact, and we’ll just pretend this shit didn’t happen.”

Mercer bared his teeth, swearing colorfully as he paced the room. He stalked over to one of the tables in what Stiles had come to think of as the Cistern’s handle, considering the shape of the room. It was outfitted much like the rest of the Guild’s headquarters: fire hazardous dark wood, and solid rock floors.

Mercer snatched up an honest to Akatosh tome, like the ancient elvish tomes in the arcaneum back at school. Stiles whistled low and Mercer flipped to a dog eared page.

“And Caine himself would be struck down for his defiance,” Mercer read aloud. “Impaled on a spike of cold blue, in the Kingdom of the Blackest Reaches. And he would enact the very Masquerade itself, tying his murderous childe to the darkness. His blood would drip, becoming the geodes and the rubies and the sapphires that men would crave. His body, a curse that would taint the very energy that claimed him. And when the root that contained the energies of Nirn would turn crimson, the sons of Akatosh must take up the bow and blessed arrow, lest the tyranny of the sun comes to an end.”

Stiles blinked slowly, staring at Mercer with a pitying look. “What the fuck does _any_ of that have to do with me? What the fuck does any of that—what the fuck—“ Stiles shook his head, breathing out slowly to calm himself. “Are you out of your mind? Midlife crisis? Aren’t you just like thirty-five? Because I swear to _Mora…”_

“I’ve seen a root of crimson.” Mercer went on, as though Stiles wasn’t deeply questioning the man’s grasp on reality. “We just need a mage’s know how to find out what the Blackest Reaches are. You have access to the Mages of Winterhold, correct?”

“I _am_ a mage of Winterhold, you fucking weenie.” Stiles snapped, and then promptly tuned Mercer out. The man had started rambling about covering his bases and getting back the Dawnguard for their disrespect, and showing up the Brotherhood. Stiles wondered how far up your own ass you had to be to entertain such delusions, and try to paint it as something amazing or something more than just unbridled greed. Mercer just wanted to get rich. The very goddamn least he could do was admit that and just say that outright instead of—

Doing whatever the fuck he was doing with that weird bronze pin.

Stiles tuned back into Mercer’s rant just in time to hear the Black-Briar girl’s pleased and proud agreement. He barely held back a scoff.

“An emissary is only as strong as his alpha,” Mercer began, pacing back and forth in front of Stiles who didn’t hold back his scoff this time. His power had fuck all to do with any alpha, it was one hundred percent his own power and his own high magic reserves.

“And you’re alpha-less, aren’t you?”

Stiles didn’t design to answer, instead focusing his magic to his palms. Mercer was talking nonsense about a get rich quick scheme that would put the Guild back on top, leave him rich, and Stiles dead, and Stiles _didn’t fucking care._

A roar dragged Mercer out of his monologue, cocking his ear towards where Stiles assumed the exit was.

“What was that?” the Black-Briar girl whispered urgently.

Stiles was silent, watching as Mercer’s eyes narrowed. The room was tense; the three nameless Guild members all had a hand on their side arms as they all waited for the eerie silence to dissipate.

“It was nothing, Amelia,” Mercer decided, casting a glance at Stiles who stared back blandly. Mercer dragged a chair away right in front of Stiles, and in the moment he moved to sit, Stiles released the spells he was holding; the purple and black of conjuration crackling and disappearing and leaving him with a daedric dagger to slice through the rope that tied his hands, just as his other hand, enveloped in the orange-yellow of a _telekinesis_ spell, threw Mercer’s chair into the Guild member next to him.

“Why you little-!” yelled the grunt to Stiles’ right, scrambling for his sidearm, but Stiles reacted faster, catching the guy in the groin with his bony elbow once before slamming him again in the kidney twice before he fell. Stiles sprung up, grabbing his wooden chair and throwing it into the grunt that was charging at him from Amelia’s side. He fell, easier than Stiles thought he would.

With the three grunts down, Stiles whipped around to turn his attention back to Mercer, who had gotten to his feet, but Stiles wasn’t about to let him stay that way for long. He brought orange-yellow back to his hands and lifted the man into the air, face scrunched in concentration as he threw the Guild Leader into the far wall, where he fell and crumpled to the floor.

Stiles let out a sharp breath and a curse, the click of a gun’s safety being disengaged ringing in his ears. He put his hands up, palms facing out as he turned slowly to face Amelia, who was shaking, pistol equipped with a silencer, and aimed at his chest.

He swallowed sharply.

“Look at this mess you’ve made,” Amelia said slowly, fury lowering her voice. “But you didn’t kill them.”

“Just call me Batman.” Stiles replied, despite himself.

“I’ll call you splattered against the wall if you don’t cooperate.”

Stiles winced, wondering how his day had gone so fucking sideways.

“We’ve been planning his heist for years, and you think you can just decide not to get involved? You want to be noble? You deal in the Dark Brotherhood, you’re no better or worse than the rest of us. You’re in this.”

“’M not.” Stiles puffed, wiggling his fingers. Amelia flinched. “I _know_ a member of the Dark Brotherhood, but it’s not like I’m wheeling and dealing with them. I handle my own shit when I have to.”

“It doesn’t matter. We need you for this, why can’t you just go along with it?”

“You literally threatened to kill me?” Stiles cocked his head as another roar sounded, closer this time, and Amelia jolted.

“What i _s_ that?” Amelia shouted, aiming her gun away from his chest, just long enough for Stiles’ hands to turn cold, _frostbite_ flying from his palms as a shot rang out.

“I’m in here, Scott!” Stiles yelled, cupping his hands around his mouth. He walked towards Amelia’s mostly frozen form, eying the bullet that had been frozen in place, barely out of the barrel of the gun. He caught Amelia’s furious glare and grinned.

“Mercer said you had a pet beast.”

“Don’t be rude. He’s not my pet.”

There was the sound of wood breaking and Scott cursing, before calling out “Stiles? Where are you?”

“Follow your nose!”

“Guey, estamos en un drenaje, no voy a usar mi nariz para nada más de lo que tengo que. Voy a vomitar! Ahorita mismo en tus botas.” Scott appeared from around a dark corner, looking human but peeved and worried. He took in the crumpled bodies on the floor, then looked at Stiles who gave him a broad grin.

“So, what, I leave you alone for ten minutes and you get hijacked by the Guild?”

“Like I asked to be.” Scott stalked over, wrapping his arm around Stiles to tug him close for a brief scenting. “Did you smell my blood?”

“Yep.” Scott lifted his head from Stiles’ shoulder to glance at Amelia. “What’s her deal?”

Stiles wiggled out of Scott’s grasp, intent on grabbing the tome on the table and the bronze object that Mercer had been waving around, sliding them both into his bag that was also on the table.

“Let’s get out of here,” Stiles started, grabbing the hem of Scott’s shirt. “It fucking reeks.”

“You’re telling me?” Scott groaned. “Fuck. I still feel like barfing. We’re in the sewer, you know? They couldn’t even be bothered to bring you to the Cistern proper.”

“I’m insulted.”

“So is my nose, dude.”

Allison was in the Ragged Flagon when they made their way back out into the Ratway, clad in her Dawnguard uniform. She was talking to Brynjolf, whose handsome face was creased and perplexed. At his side was Vex, whose arms were folded, but she didn’t look angry. Just tired.

“He makes me want to _swoon_.” Stiles said as they crossed the bridge to the underground bar.

“Who, Brynjolf?” Scott asked. “You’ve got it bad for dudes with scruff, don’t you? And beards?”

“If that was the case, wouldn’t I have jumped you by now?”

Scott scratched as his well-groomed beard that put Stiles’ often scruffy offering to shame. With the buzzed hair, Scott looked a bit older, and it worked for him. Yeah, it was super hot, Stiles supposed, but it was also _Scott_ and Scott had once asked him if shaving his nuts was a bad idea. Scott had also bought him lube in a completely platonic fashion, so Scott’s apparent hotness was completely lost on Stiles.

“You found him!” Allison cheered, giving the pair a dazzling smile. Stiles grinned back, and she seemed to relax a bit, the tense stance she was in falling when Scott and Stiles came to stand by her side. Brynjolf, however, was frowning.

“I deeply apologize on behalf of the Guild for your abduction.” Brynjolf started, with ramrod straight politeness. Vex nodded her agreement. “Won’t happen again, lad.”

“And if it’s alright with you, Stiles,” Vex put in, “The Guild would like to handle Mercer in our own way.”

Stiles shrugged. Clearly, they had no idea what their Guild leader was up to, and he couldn’t hold it against them if they were going to deal with Mercer’s slimy self. More than half the reason he had been consistently moved to treat with the Guild was because of Vex and Brynjolf.

“As long as he’s actually dealt with, our working relationship will remain intact with you and Vex.”

“And the rest of the Guild?”

Stiles shook his head once. “Personal favors I can do on a case by case basis, but this only extends to you and Vex.”

Usually, he’d tack on an apology at the end, but Stiles hated, _hated_ having guns pointed at him.

Brynjolf huffed his agreement and Vex nodded. Stiles gave them both a half smile, and didn’t say anything but privately wished one of those personal favors from Brynjolf was sexual.

Scott slanted his eyes at Stiles, probably knowing and smelling perfectly well what Stiles was grinning about.

“We’ll be in touch, Bryn. Vex.” Allison shook both of their hands and nodded at the two boys to follow her out of the Ragged Flagon. Once they reached the relative privacy of the Ratway though, Allison spun on them, eyes narrowed in annoyance and worry.

“Do you two want to tell me what the fuckshit just happened in there?” She seethed. Scott held his hands up, placatingly, but Stiles rolled his eyes.

“That’s not very fair,” he drawled.

He and Allison got on decently for the most part. Once she and Scott had broken up, post _intense_ amounts of therapy, it was almost like a weight they didn’t know was there was released, and Stiles let go of some of his issues, but admittedly, not all of them. He would never trust her completely, not the way he trusted Scott or Braeden or Lydia.

It was a little tough at times; of _course_ Scott trusted Allison with no issues, Braeden was Allison’s girlfriend and Lydia was her best friend. But for Stiles, there was a little too much to let go. He felt protective over Scott when it came to Allison because Scott still trusted so _easily_. And yeah, it was Allison, Stiles understood that. He did. It was unreasonable, he knew he was being a little unreasonable. After all, he forgave Scott for their teenaged struggles, but Stiles simply didn’t trust the Dawnguard, which Allison quickly became a member of the moment she could. The Dawnguard were ruthless, more about the attack and destruction and less about protecting those that needed it.

And all of that? All of that would be ignoring that blow out fight they had during his first year of college.

Stiles could forgive, and he _did_ for the most part, because fuck, they were _teenagers_ , he couldn’t forget. Going against Allison’s wishes had saved their asses far too many times for him to go back on that now.

And it wasn’t like they didn’t get along. It was that just about everything Stiles did was for the benefit of the pack. Allison’s loyalties were divided between the pack and the Dawnguard, and no matter what her reasoning was, Stiles wouldn’t tolerate it.

“Mercer wanted me for some get rich quick scheme, so he had someone bean me over the head and drag me into the sewer.”

“A lady wolf came up to me asking if I knew you.” Scott said, shoving his hands in his pockets. He nodded towards the corridor, trying to urge them to move on. The smell must've been killing him.

“Must’ve been Amara,” Stiles put together. “So you came to find me.”

“Yeah, she seemed worried. Friend of yours?”

“New supplier. I think she’ll be a better Riften match for us than the Guild. She’s got three kids and oh my god, werewolf kids are adorable. When are you going to let me be an uncle?”

“Focus, Stiles,” Allison said from behind them. “Did Mercer say anything weird when he had you?”

“Nothing all that interesting,” Stiles lied, and Scott puffed. “But he was waving this around.” He pulled out the bronze pin, giving it a closer look as he turned it over in his hand.

“Where did you get that?” Allison hissed, reaching for it. Stiles held it out of her reach.

“What is it?”

Allison didn’t look like she wanted to answer, which was just fucking typical. Stiles slid the pin back into his bag.

“Uh, guys,” Scott started, his arms wrapping around Stiles and Allison’s middles, pushing them along. “I love your shitty stand offs as much as anyone else but—“

“Fuck off.” Stile snapped without heat.

“Tu primero. We can talk about it outside of the Ratway because I’m serious: You guys are going to have to clean your shoes if we don’t get out of here.”

Allison and Stiles both grunted their approval of the plan, and Scott dragged them above ground.

 

Later, when the smell of sewers had been washed off of them in their hotel and Allison had changed into normal clothes, she held her hand out to Stiles.

“Give me the key, Stiles.”

“In hell, Argent.”

Scott, for his part, merely looking at the two of them with raised eyebrows before picking up chopsticks with a sigh. He wanted nothing to do with the brewing argument—he had stopped bothering getting in between Stiles and Allison after the first fight they got into when Stiles was visiting Beacon Hills from college. Scott was fairly sure they would never be friends again after that. They made it through that, so this? This was minor. The most Scott would do is keep others out of it.

Allison swore. “That’s a daedric artifact. It belongs with the Dawnguard for protection.”

Stiles barked a laugh, leaning on his folded fist. “Oh yeah? And when the Vigilants of Stendarr show up, wanting to know why the Dawnguard is cavorting with Daedra, you’re going to say..? What? They’re more trigger happy than the Dawnguard are.”

“If I’m so trigger happy, why didn’t I just shoot you in the hand and take it?”

Scott made a high pitched screeching sound in the back of his throat and Stiles threw his hands up in the air.

“Well shit Allison, if the fucking boot fits, feel free to lace that bitch up and wear it.”

Allison’s eyes narrowed, Stiles’ eyes widened, and Scott coughed to break them up. “Ally, at least tell us what it is, maybe? I’m curious.”

“It’s Lady Nocturnal’s Skeleton Key.” Stiles answered instead.

“How did you know that?” Allison asked.

“I graduated from the Mage’s College with a major in Conjuring. Knowing about the Daedra might as well be the first class.”

“So why did you ask me, then?”

“Confirmation? I know what I’m getting myself into by having it, do you? I fuck around with daedra with every conjuring spell I use.”

“It’s shit like this that makes people hate mages.”

“No, it’s a complete lack of knowledge when it comes to the arcane arts. People still think there’s good or evil magic, and that’s just—wow.” Stiles shook his head, clacking his chopsticks. “Why would magic, a force, subscribe to human morality? It has nothing to do with a mage if people want to understand that or not.”

“It’s undefined. Dangerous.”

“The best things in life are.” Stiles started eating, a clear end to the conversation. “Plus, I almost died because of it. I’ll give it to Brynjolf when I’m ready to. Maybe I’ll use it for leverage.”

Allison, however, didn’t look convinced, and gave Scott a pleading look. Scott shrugged with a tiny smile.

“I’m not the alpha; I can’t just demand Stiles do something.” Stiles grinned in response to this, but Scott ignored him. “And even if I was? I’d say Stiles holding the key for leverage seems like it could work.”

“That doesn’t take into account that Nocturnal may show up and demand answers.”

“Daedra don’t have that kind of power anymore,” Stiles interrupted. “And I have answers.”

“You don’t know that.”

“What, you do?”

“Guys, stop.” Scott’s eyes flashed gold. Stiles ducked his head and shoved cold noodles in his mouth. “You want me to decide? Stiles keeps it, and we take it back home. Cora gets to hold it; she’s a priestess, right? She’s the safest.”

“I don’t like this.” Allison said after a moment. A waiter came by with their sushi and Allison gave him a tiny smile. Stiles snagged one from her plate and swapped it with one of his.

“It’s gonna be fine, Ally. Trust me.”


	9. i was so young, you should have known better than to lean on me

Fort Dawnguard was the de-Facto base for the Dawnguard for Tamriel. It wasn't the only one, not by far, but the fort in the Rift was the highest populated and the most well guarded from threats. It was ran by a man named Isran whom Stiles was frightened of, and Scott wasn't too fond of either, but Isran seemed to dote on Allison.

 

It was horrifying to see the man's lips curl into something close to a pleased smile when Allison walked into a room. Apparently, he was close to her father.

 

“Isran!” Allison greeted, her arms open to fling around the older man's shoulders in a hug. Stiles trailed behind her, looking up and around the tall stone walls of Fort Dawnguard.

 

Stiles liked Fort Dawnguard in theory. It was a huge stone fortress, tempered by time and reinforced with steel. It had panic rooms, high walls, and enough food and supplies to last for a few years even at maximum capacity. It was also an escape from the mundane world; everyone in the fort knew the score. Mer moved about freely without judgment, mages knew him by name and he could get frostbite venom without ever getting _near_ one of those beasts that roamed the wilds of the Rift.

 

On the negative side though, Fort Dawnguard was also full of paranoid fanatics that wouldn't quite understand why he willingly spent time with werewolves, which is why Scott insisted on staying at the hotel. They were mostly hunters. Not everyone, of course, Isran didn’t mind werewolves as long as they weren’t going on murdering rampages, but there were a few people that held the ideals of a typical hunter. It was exhausting, and Stiles refused to explain himself after the first few visits to the fort, and he was too precious a resource for them to irritate too much.

 

“Allison, I’m going to head over to the lab,” Stiles said after a moment of watching Allison and Isran chat. “Nayelli is making frantic motions at me.”

 

Allison nodded, and Stiles gave her a slight wave as he walked off, headed towards the corridor where a redguard named Nayelli was jumping up and down.

 

She was short and curvy, long brown hair pressed into a cape that flowed past her shoulders and down her back. Stiles was friendly with her, as he was to anyone who was nice enough to him, but she was loyal to the Dawnguard, same as Allison. It made things a strain at times, but Nayelli seemed to need him for something, so he followed.

 

“So, what was that all about?”

 

Nayelli held up a finger as they walked down towards her lab. “You guys took your sweet ass time getting up here. Let’s get to the lab.”

 

Stiles huffed and followed, already closing up to whatever she was going to ask.

 

“What do you know about Crimson Nirnroot?”

 

“Oh for fuck’s sake,” Stiles swore, rolling his eyes. “I know fuck all about it, why does everyone insist on dragging me underground and questioning me today?”

 

Nayelli stopped and turned, leveling Stiles with a cool look. “You done?”

 

He brushed by her, walking into Nayelli’s lab to find one of the low benches she had so he could put up his legs. Whatever she had to say, she could say it to his closed eyes.

 

“Wake up, pendejo. You’re good with Nirnroot, and I have questions.”

 

“I’m listening. I don’t need my eyes to fuckin’ listen. You’re the one who gave me a load of attitude for no reason.”

 

Nayelli rolled her eyes. “You need your eyes, open ‘em up. I want to show you something.”

 

Stiles cracked an eye open, half expecting a smack for his troubles, but instead, Nayelli had lined up a set of five Crimson Nirnroot in separate containers, glass sitting atop glass. The containers below the glass pots were full of red liquid, and to Stiles, it looked like diluted blood. The five nirnroot were still mostly the deep crimson that he’d come to know as _crimson nirnroot_ , save for one, and it looked like the color was fading from it.

 

In fact, it looked more like the usual blue-green that common nirnroot was.

 

“Alright, so, I know you do alchemy, but you went to Winterhold for what?”

 

“Conjuration. And alteration, I guess.”

 

“I went for botanical alchemy, and I can tell you truthfully, Crimson Nirnroot is real. It exists, but it’s not supposed to spring above ground.”

 

Stiles blinked slowly, Nayelli smirked and handed him a stack of papers and books -- notes, Stiles supposed at a brief glance.

 

“I just need a second opinion on something having to do with this.” She leaned down and heaved up a microscope and set it on the table, motioning for Stiles to walk over to where she was standing. “I get caught up in research sometimes, and maybe I’m going insane from it all, so I need a fresh pair of eyes to take a look.”

 

Stiles slid off the bench as Nayelli set up a slide.

 

“So what am I looking at?” Stiles asked, peering into the lens.

 

“At the moment, blood. I just need you to see the comparison. Take a close look at the thickness and how it looks.”

 

“Uh huh, go on.”

 

“Alright, I’m going to add a little water to the slide… It’s distilled, okay?”

 

Stiles nodded, and watched as the blood diluted. Nothing strange or different there.

 

“So what’s the problem?”

 

“Okay, so,” Nayelli pointed to the nirnroot that had begun to fade. “These were all collected in the last three weeks, after I saw a bunch growing near a Dwemer ruin. I’ve been watering them with distilled water, and I knocked one over and the water had turned red. So I started letting the plants drip into the containers.”

 

“The water had blood in it when you checked it out, right?” Stiles guessed, and Nayelli nodded.

 

“How’d you know?”

 

“Some of this sprung up in my neck of the woods. I brought Scott along with me to look into it, and he said the area where they were smelt strongly of blood, but it also smelt really bad. Not a typically bloody scent.”

 

Nayelli made a considering noise, tapping her finger against her chin. “Good to know. My issue is why is this happening?”

 

“I’d tell you if I knew.” Stiles replied, chewing a nail. “You said that Crimson Nirnroot is actually a thing, it’s not just bloody nirnroot?”

 

“That’s right, but it just _doesn’t_ appear above ground.” Nayelli crossed her arms and leaned back against her workbench. “It’s driving me crazy, like we have a bunch of pieces to a puzzle that obviously go together, but I don’t know enough about the picture it’s supposed to be to even begin piecing it together.”

 

Stiles nodded, he knew that feeling well. But, unlike Nayelli, who got pissed off about that type of thing, Stiles enjoyed the challenge of it all. He just needed more information.

 

“So if it doesn’t appear up here, then where underground does it appear?”

 

Nayelli huffed. “You think you can figure this one out?”

 

“Try me.”

 

She puffed her cheeks out, looking oddly like a chipmunk with acorn stuffed cheeks. “Alright. There hasn’t been any talk of this kind of thing in a few eras, maybe since the Fourth Era? And all the books I read on it are in the Arcanem in Winterhold, so I just have my notes and memory.”

 

“I’ve worked with less, let’s do it.” Stiles sat and spread out the books in front of him, motioning for Nayelli to sit down as well. “Where do you find Crimson Nirnroot in the wild?”

 

“I don’t know a proper translation for it, honestly. In Dwemeris it’s _Fal Zhardum Din_ , and my notes say the rough translation is _Blackest Kingdom Reaches_ and that means fuck all to me.”

 

Stiles grunted. Mercer had mentioned something like that when he was ranting, but he doubted Nayelli would care about that. “Anyone ever seen it? Fal Zhardum Din, I mean.”

 

“Mmm,” Nayelli grabbed a faded book, and pressed it into Stiles’ hand. “This is the journal of one Sinderion, the only man known to have travelled to Fal Zhardum Din. You read this, see if you can make heads or tails of what he’s talking about -- it’s almost like he’s speaking in tongues. I’ll photocopy the Nirnroot Missive as well. You’ve read it, right?”

 

“Yeah, fifth year alchemy.”

 

“Nice. I wrote down everything in it, so maybe this will help.”

 

“Nayelli, it’s not that I’m not grateful for all of this but shouldn’t you do it?”

 

Nayelli gave half a shrug and picked up a handful of her notebooks. “Mysteries aren’t my thing, and I have a ton of work to do. One of the werewolves we captured escaped the other night.”

 

Stiles frowned. “You know how I feel about what you guys do to werewolves you capture. Why tell me that?”

 

“It was Peter Hale.”


	10. i don't know how to talk to you

Derek didn't find it at all weird that he monitored his pack's heartbeats, even when he could see them. In fact, it was soothing. He could hear five heartbeats at the moment, as his pack had taken over the den area, sprawled all around him.

 

Scott's pack seemed less codependent; all of them had their own homes and apartments, even if they seemed to spend most of their days wandering in and out of what Derek had mentally dubbed their pack house. Without Scott around though, it was fairly brief visits for a chat or to eat from the well-stocked fridge. Stiles and Braeden seemed to keep the pack house equipped to handle werewolf appetites and their desire to sprawl near each other.

 

When Braeden mentioned to Derek that the house belonged to her and Stiles, he was hardly surprised. The house reeked of the stormy smell of magic, and Stiles' particular high note of ozone and cold.

 

No one else was home. According to the whiteboard that Derek found in the kitchen, Braeden was at work, which was a sort of nebulous statement to Derek, because that could mean anything. He didn't know her terribly well, but she seemed to be an integral part of Scott's pack. If he didn't know better, she was probably the one who shooed the rest of the pack out of the house for the day, leaving just Derek and his pack alone for awhile.

 

 From what he had gathered, his pack had arrived back in Beacon Hills about two or so weeks ago, and he had been in pretty bad shape for awhile. He pulled through, obviously, but he had also been feral for a handful of days before coming out of it.

 

So, he was fine, and would be better if his pack would tell him what exactly happened. He was missing far too many chunks of his memory for him to be comfortable with the lack of panic within his pack. The last thing he remembers is Cora, bathed in blood, at the Thalmor's keep in Northwatch. She was shifted into her glabro form, tossing aside elves in an effort to get to him. Derek can remember scents more than he can remember what was going on, weakened by months of torture and his lack of belief that he would _ever_ be saved.

 

He remembers more of the before, when he was trapped and treated like less than a sentient being, the howls and whimpers and keening from Garou that were in the same cage he was in.

 

Derek swallowed. He wasn't there anymore. And maybe he wasn't _fine_ but he was alright, all things considered. Safe.

 

Boyd nudged his leg softly, from where he was sitting on the floor with Erica. Derek met his look and gave him a slow blink that Boyd seemed to accept, and he turned his attention back to Erica. Derek himself was surrounded by pillows and blankets and the scent of pack; Cora to his right, her thigh pressed against his looking over some notes Braeden had given her, as she “wanted to help”. Boyd was curled around Erica in a sort of C shape in front of him, with Erica slouched low in the space he created, hands on a gamepad, face intense. It was peaceful, quiet in a way that Derek missed and never thought he would get again, but it also bothered him.

 

“So..?” Derek started, drumming his fingers against Cora's leg. She swatted at him.

 

“So?” Boyd rumbled as Erica cursed.

 

“Eat kraken, fuck face.” She fumed, to Boyd's amusement.

 

“We're not talking about things?”

 

“Cause you're just so chatty, right?” Cora said mildly, not lifting her eyes from her tablet.

 

Derek pulled a blanket over his face.

 

“Besides,” Cora spoke again. “It's handled. You, personally handled it. You don’t have anything to worry about besides your upcoming Alpha meeting.”

 

“Don't give me kid gloves.”

 

“What do you want us to say? That we almost tore ourselves apart looking for you? That we're all bathed in the blood of Garou that had no choice? What is there to talk about here?”

 

Derek paused. He ran a tight knit pack, a pack that had no problem talking to him and leaning on his strength. The pulled answers from him when needed, pulled his fears and his truths from him. They _worked_. If they thought he didn't need to know, then maybe they were right.

 

But he wanted to know. He deserved to know.

 

“There's chunks of my memory missing.” Derek's voice was muffled by the blanket, and raspy from disuse. Cora stuck her hand under the blanket to scratch at his scalp. “I don't think I'm asking for a lot here.”

 

“You really are.” Boyd said slowly. “What do you remember?”

 

“Pg-13 version please, there's little ears listening.” Erica said, dry as you please. It startled a laugh out of Derek.

 

“I remember most of the before, and I remember being there. Once you guys got there, I'm fuzzy.”

 

“The electricity, probably,” Cora put in, her tone like ice.

 

“Oof, I guess we're playing hardball.” Erica leaned back and smacked Derek's leg.

 

“Alright, I'll go first since we're playing hardball.” Cora switched off her tablet and tossed it to the side. “I'm gonna guess that you're still processing what happened?”

 

Derek grunted. He had come a long way as an alpha, he felt. There had been long nights of talking until their throats were sore, and Derek felt like his guts had been scraped out with a pumpkin carving spoon. At first it was little things, little werewolf things that Derek could help with, and then it was bigger things. Eventually, it was anything. His pack knew they could speak openly and freely to him about anything. It worked for them, as vicious and flippant as it all seemed.

 

“Not yet.” Derek replied. There was a lot to shift through, and he honestly didn't want to touch it, not yet. It could simmer as nightmares and regrets for the time being.

 

“We killed most of the Thalmor in there, but some escaped.” Boyd put in helpfully.

 

“That's not what you want to tell me.”

 

“You're right.” Cora tugged the blanket off Derek's head and let it fall around his shoulders. “I found you in a cage. Shackled in silver, open wounds where you wouldn't stop fighting and couldn't heal. They were using electricity on you, and I know that because they did it to _me_.”

 

After that, they all started talking.

 

“It smelled awful, your healing wouldn't work, even when we took off the shackles.”

 

“You were shifted, and I don't think you could see. You kept sniffing Erica.”

 

“We had to drag you out of there. Some wolves tried to stop us.”

 

They paused, as if they couldn't figure out what to continue with.

 

“And then a wizard slammed Erica into a wall. You howled so loud that my teeth rattled and you shifted into _Crinos_. Ripped that Altmer in half.”

 

“We started letting out Garou that could fight.”

 

“Torched the place when it was all over. But you couldn't shift back.”

 

“'S why I woke up feral.” Derek put together, shaking his head.

 

“You were in crinos form for awhile. Protection instinct, I guess, I assume it was worse because of Erica. We just pointed you where to go, and you kept us safe.”

 

“We were outside of Beacon Heights when you went lupus and couldn't wake up.”

 

“And we've been here ever since.”

 

They weren't lying, because they didn't lie to Derek; they had no reason to lie to him. Years of living out of suitcases and in each other's pockets wouldn't allow for lying. But Boyd still seemed tense, even as Erica leaned closer and he wrapped an arm around her belly. Derek found it soothing as well, the simple sound of new life made going on a little bit easier.

 

“How are the twins?” Derek offered – there was too much to sort through, too many things that the pack couldn't say. But Cora was right. They were currently safe, even with the town's Alpha away, they could at least defend themselves.

 

“They're exhausting.” Erica scowled. “It's actually a myth that you have to eat for an entire person when you're pregnant, but I think it's true for wolves. They're already little red-meat craving porkers.”

 

“Born garou, then.”

 

“Bitten wolves can have born wolves?”

 

“Yep. A pair of born garou will always have more of the same. You're both bitten, so it's more of a 67% or so chance. Humans and garou are a toss up.”

 

“Oh, cool. Are they going to be able to shift?”

 

“Not at first.” Derek got to his feet, leaving most of the blankets in the den as he shuffled towards the stairs. “They're going to eat a lot though. Invest in a pump.”

 

“A pump?” Boyd asked as Erica and Cora cracked up.

 

Derek bit back a grin. They'd be okay.

 

Later, Derek let Lydia into the house to discuss the state of the territory. Derek had tried to avoid her, avoid the questions that she was bound to ask, but there wasn't avoiding Lydia when she wanted to find you. She wanted him to be aware of their treaties, non-aggression pacts, and enemies, both hostile and not. Derek said that was for their alpha to concern himself with, and Lydia rolled her eyes.

 

Lydia always dressed like she had somewhere important to be; always heels, freshly cleaned and pressed clothing, matching accessories and perfectly made up face. Derek, on the other hand, had on a hoodie and loose sweats that Lydia eyed with a raised eyebrow before motioning for him to sit at the kitchen table with her.

 

“I don't have a ton for you to sign today, actually,” she started, plucking neatly collected folders from her bag. “Most of it is for you to look over – properties, investments and treaties that were signed in your name. You need to be caught up on it, because you were seen in Beacon Heights and packs have been chomping at the bit to meet with you and confirm these with you personally.”

 

Derek swallowed down a case of cotton mouth. “For what?”

 

Lydia's lips thinned. “You're the alpha.”

 

“Scott's the alpha. That much was obvious before he left.”

 

“Scott doesn't _want_ to be the alpha.” Lydia crossed her legs politely. “He acts like an acting alpha if anything, but Stiles took his emissary oath. So he's handled most of this political stuff blind, and now it's up to you to decide what we do. You can deal with Scott if you want. Stiles is the emissary of the area, that's not up for question.”

 

“I don't think I should.” Derek's hoodie happened to be down, but he desperately wanted to pull it up and over his head. “I haven't been here, and I don't lead this pack, I have my own.”

 

Although Lydia's face didn't twitch, Derek could smell the sharp scent of irritation pouring off her. He kept her gaze though, his eyes steadily meeting hers, until Lydia broke it to settle the folder in front her.

 

“Look,” she started. “I am not Scott who's forgiven you--”

 

Derek barked a laugh. As if he needed Scott's forgiveness.

 

Lydia powered on. “I'm _not_ Stiles, who either wants to hit you with his jeep or cry or a day and a half when he sees you. I do not forgive you for leaving us when we were _children_ and we needed you here. You left us in this territory and it's so painfully yours that the only thing that kept us from getting ripped apart by other packs was Stiles. I don't give a shit about how you feel about Stiles either, I don't care about your messy emotions, I just want this pack to be okay.”

 

She leaned forward and tapped the folders in front of her. “I care about our extended stability. I care about my friends. I'm not going to step around eggshells for you, Derek Hale. You need to be wrangled, and I have no problem doing that.”

 

Derek heaved a sigh through his nose and took the folders, flipping through the first one. The last thing he wanted to do was fight Lydia, and it wasn't like he had any plans for leaving Beacon Hills. Erica needed the stability; hell, his whole pack needed the stability. He could at least see what Scott's wayward pack had gotten themselves into while he was gone.

 

“What do you need from me?”

 

“Frankly, nothing.” Lydia shrugged. “You and Scott need to talk about this alpha thing, I just wanted to make it clear that you _will_ be doing this. Stiles isn't a wolf, he's a mage, and he shouldn't have to do your jobs for you on top of his. He's been running himself ragged since he graduated, and I'm not going to watch him run himself into the ground.”

 

Derek grunted. He didn't expect anything else; Stiles threw himself into something whole heartedly when he cared about it.

 

“That top folder has the various treaties we've been offered over the years. Some are bound and signed by both Stiles and Scott, some are bound by just Stiles. You're going to look over all of them and set aside the ones you're interested in keeping.”

 

“Okay.”

 

“Okay what?”

 

“Okay, yeah, I'll get it done.” Derek raised his eyes to give Lydia a _look_ , which she ignored.

 

“Good. Your inheritance is still in your name, some of it was invested, and we bought the land owned by your family back. Your building was rented out, save for your loft, which is probably dusty.”

 

Derek's mind was reeling. Traditionally, an Alpha was simply the strongest member of the pack. But if a pack had settled into a territory, like the Hales did, the Alpha was more than just the Alpha to their specific pack, they were the Alpha to their entire territory. It was a lot of responsibility and Derek knew perfectly well that they second other alphas knew a Hale, a Hale _Alpha_ was back in the territory, there would be talks.

 

Talks of him taking over the territory in his mother and his sister's stead, talks of whether or not he was good enough to lead, and then there would be less talking, more growling and Derek would have to prove himself.

 

If he wanted it, that is.

 

“Hale house was torn down, maybe three years ago? We took out anything salvageable, and you'll have to talk to Stiles about getting that stuff.” Lydia went on, completely unaware, or maybe uncaring of Derek's reactions to hearing about anything having to do with Stiles. “The property is still yours. It's all still yours, if you want it. I don't know what you said to Stiles, but he kept it all for you.”

 

“Nothing. I didn't say anything to him.”

 

“Obviously.” Lydia scowled. “If it wasn't for him, we would have sold off a lot of that and opened new stores in Beacon Heights and Beacon Hollow and tripled profits for Wolf's Bane. You know why we haven't done that? Because Stiles wanted you to have something to come home to.”

 

“Lydia, no.” Derek held up a hand, and Lydia narrowed her eyes.

 

“Don't you dare tell me no.”

 

“Stiles and I aren't up for discussion. I haven't spoken to him yet, why would I talk about him to you first?”

 

“What makes you think he'll want to have a conversation about it?” Derek started and Lydia smoothed down her skirt, resting her elbows on the table and clasping her hands together to rest her chin on. “Now, my role in the pack could probably be considered minor because I do a variety of things for us. And we're still the most put together and well-run pack in the State. That's all me and Stiles. Are you staying?”

 

“Staying? What, here?”

 

“No, the moon.” Lydia scoffed. “Don't be dense. Are you staying in Beacon Hills?”

 

“Yes.” Derek said quickly. “I don't want to keep dragging my pack all over the continent. Not while Erica is pregnant, or even after the twins are born.”

 

Lydia seemed minutely pleased by that answer and reached for another folder. “I'll need your moons, for our new bestiary.”

 

She pushed the another folder into Derek's hands. “I know you probably think I'm being obnoxious and sticking my nose into your life, but one, I'm not, and two I don't care. You left. We've had to figure this all out by ourselves; how to present ourselves as a coherent pack, how to fight away attackers because of the Nemeton, how to treat with elder packs and roaming alphas. We needed you here, and you weren't. So, we did it ourselves, and busted our asses to do it. I won't let you fuck up all we built because you don't know what you want.”

 

“I want my pack to be happy?” Derek sat back in his seat. He wasn't confused about how Lydia was feeling, she made that clear in no uncertain terms that she didn't trust him. “I want to live in peace? It wasn't just rough for you.”

 

“I don't doubt you.” Her heartbeat was steady – she did, in fact, care. “But we have a system. It works. It's been next to perfect since before Stiles even got back, and now we're a well working machine. Whether you decide to retake this territory or not, I need to know that soon. Putting it off won't help anyone.”

 

Derek nodded. “I understand.”

 

“Do you?”

 

“Yes.”

 

Lydia looked at him searchingly, eyes critical and seemingly all knowing as she let the silence stretch. Derek cleared his throat.

 

“If you still want the store in Beacon Heights,” Derek started, unsure of his words, but sure of his intent, “I'll pay for the startup and initial costs.”

 

“Deal.” Lydia smiled, the first smile he'd seen on her face since she'd walked in. “Welcome back.”

 

“Thank you,” Derek replied, still unsure of where he stood with her. “I think.”

 

“Don't think this is me letting go of how you hurt him.” Lydia was still smiling. “He's not perfect. He fucks up, just like all of us, gets ahead of himself, throws himself into whatever he cares about without thinking twice, and he's hurt me too. Left without a word, a phone call for a break up. He explained himself, eventually, and I get it. I get why he wanted control.”

 

Lydia collected up her tablet and extra folders. “I don't understand what would make you want to throw that in his face. A werewolf of all people throwing someone else's desire for control in their face.”

 

“I know what I said and it wasn't that.” Derek tried to defend himself, but Lydia was unmoved. She shook her head.

 

“'Mages are power hungry assholes with no boundaries.'” she recited, and Derek winced. “You took the only thing he used to defend himself and made him feel like shit for it.”

 

Derek could do nothing more than look down. His fear and anger had won out that day, it had taken over, and he knew he hurt Stiles. He just wasn't given a chance to make it better and talk it over, and the hurt had been left unchecked. It would be harder to get Stiles' forgiveness after this.

 

But that didn't matter now. What mattered was the fact that Stiles seemed to have moved on from their short romance.

 

And Derek hadn't.

  


Stiles, Scott and Allison returned to Beacon Hills a few days later, looking cheery faced and content. Allison was perched on Stiles’ back, and the two were bickering playfully.

“So fuckin’ go home!” Stiles squawked as Allison pulled on his cheeks.

 

“I am home, my girlfriend lives here.” Allison replied, prim. Scott laughed, and Derek tried to make himself small and unobtrusive.

 

“Okay? Go see your dad. I know he got a plane before we did, he’s gotta be around here now.”

 

“Pot and kettle.” Scott hummed in response, tossing their suitcases to the floor.

 

“Are you trying to get rid of me?” Allison asked, and Derek couldn’t help but turn and look at the people he once considered a bunch of children.

 

Scott had grown, vertically and horizontally, along with an easy set of his shoulders that spoke of growing into his skin. Derek would have to test him to be sure, but he could tell from a distance. Scott had settled into being bitten. The last time Derek had seen him, Scott’s hair was _short_ but now it was cropped close to his scalp, and he had grown a beard instead. It looked good on him, Derek decided.

 

Allison looked different than his memories provided as well, her once youthful curls had been chopped off and replaced with something pitch black, short and wavy. She seemed stronger to Derek as well, and he was positive she was.

 

It was sobering to see the three of them, alive and well and thriving. Mature, if that word could be applied to Scott or Stiles.

 

“Of course I am.” Stiles’ voice broke through Derek's thoughts. “What do you take me for?”

 

At one point, Derek was positive that he would never be able to look at the three of them without the sting of betrayal making his eyes flash in rage.

 

For the first couple of years, he was still angry. He couldn’t bare to think about Allison without thinking Allison _Argent_ and all that went along with that name. For all Scott’s assurances that she couldn’t be held responsible for the actions of her family, her family’s actions became her actions as well, and all the apologies in the world wouldn’t change that. And Scott -- it felt like only recently Derek could think of him without waves of rage and hate pulling him under. He never thought he’d be able to look at the two of them, happy and healthy and smiling and feel anything but rolling waves of anger.

 

Despite his thoughts on the matter, it seemed that his pack had slowly ebbed away at the toxic swamp that was his anger and replaced it with affection and loyalty. Erica and Boyd, then Cora, then the twins that Derek already thought of as _pack_ ; that was probably why the sight of Allison and Scott didn’t piss him off endlessly.

 

It had been so long, almost six years, probably. Derek had been away, surrounded by the loving, healing pull of his pack; rubbing his shoulders, tugging him out of his funks, giving him something to look forward until he didn’t _have_ to look forward to something to want to wake up the next day.

 

“Derek!” Scott crowed, walking down the short staircase into the den. “You’re up.”

 

“Yes?” Derek gave Scott a confused look. He had woken up before Scott and Stiles had left. “Should I go?”

 

Scott tutted, easily coming to sit down right next to Derek. “Nah. I mean, it’s not my house, _sabes_? You’ve got Erica though, so you can go to your loft, but I doubt it’s enough space.”

 

“It’s not,” Allison chimed in. “And Stiles doesn’t mind, do ya?”

 

Stiles gave a non committal half shrug and barely gave Derek a glance. “I don't mind.”

 

Derek opened his mouth to respond, but Stiles slipped away, darting upstairs before Derek could even decide what he wanted to say. He let out a quiet sigh – what _did_ he want to say to Stiles? Sorry for being an asshat? I didn't run away? I love you still? I wasn't lying?

 

Ha.

 

Allison dipped up the stairs as well, probably to locate Braeden. Scott was quiet and relaxed next to him though, sunk into the comfortable couch with a content look on his face.

 

“Where were you guys?” Derek asked, wiping his sweaty hands on his jeans.

 

“Riften,” Scott answered, his body still lax. “Shit with the Guild – they really thought they could get away with starting shit with Stiles. Didn't Lydia show you our treaties?”

 

Derek nodded. “There's a few you might want to consider dissolving and letting become a little more unofficial, maybe. Why do you have a treaty with the Thieves Guild? That's not going to do anything for you but give you a headache.”

 

“For us,” Scott corrected, and Derek furrowed his brows. “Alpha Hale.”

 

Derek conceded the title; it wasn't like it was the first time he had been called that. It was a title, it was his title, but he didn't like Scott's intent. “We'll have a lot to discuss then, Alpha McCall.”

 

“Whoa there.” Scott held up his hands. “I'm not an alpha, Derek.”

 

“I don't believe you.” Scott titled his head and turned to really look at Derek, who met his gaze head on. “I'm not the alpha of this pack, I barely know any of you. I have Cora and Erica and Boyd. I'm their alpha. I can't be yours.”

 

“Being an alpha is –“ Scott paused to find the words, but his eyes turned hopeless and lost. “It's a lot. I'm not ready.”

 

“I haven't been around, but I don't think it's a matter of being ready. You just do it. Or it just happens. It's all about how your pack reacts to you, and Scott, they treat you like the alpha.”

 

“Don't you have a sort of...” Scott flapped his hands, wiggled his fingers and Derek made a go on motion with his eyebrows.

 

“An emotional connection? You need to be constantly available emotionally and you gotta be strong enough for everyone to lean on and dude, I'm just not that person.”

 

“You would think so.” Derek responded, shaking his head.

 

Admittedly, Scott was right in a sense. That was the sort of alpha Derek was – always emotionally available for his pack to come to, strong, always, steady and regular, so that they didn't always have to be. It was in his moon, Philodox, to be a calm and steady leader. Alphas could have an emotional connection to their pack if their bonds were strong, but it had nothing to do with emotional availability. It was emotional _stability_ , which Derek felt he had developed over time, and it was thanks to his pack entirely. He supposed he was a fairly typical alpha, the sort of alpha that was created through close bonds and small packs.

 

But Alpha-hood was a fluid concept and position, it was leadership as best as the garou in question knew how. Whether Scott saw himself as alpha or not, he probably was to his pack, and was best suited to run the pack as well. Derek was assuming all of this, he wouldn't be able to tell until he saw Scott with his pack.

 

“What's your moon?” Derek asked, instead of answering Scott's question.

 

“Ragabash.”

 

Derek hummed agreeably. Philodox was traditionally the leader of the pack, but Scott being a Ragabash seemed to fit with his mismatched pack.

 

'He probably doesn't see it because he's bitten,' Derek thought, tapping his fingers against his leg.

 

“You think I'm _the_ alpha, huh.”

 

For a moment, uncertainty flashed over Scott's face, before he gave a tentative reply of “I... guess?”

 

“Then why don't you let me decide if you're alpha material?”

 

“S...ure?”

 

Scott sounded a little confused, as if he wasn't expecting Derek to be so agreeable, but Scott didn't know Derek anymore. In fact, he barely knew Derek in the first place. Derek thought he would feel bitterness over their failed relationship; after all, Derek had called them brothers at one point.

 

But that was before Gerard Argent. Before the Alpha Pack. Before Derek left, and refused to think about ever coming back.

 

It could be a fresh start for them.

 

“You're being weird, dude.”

 

“Lydia drained me of all my energy.” Derek replied blandly. “This is my natural state of weirdness.”

 

Scott's laughter was startled out of him, but all Derek could smell was contentment, so he counted that as a win.

 

 

 


	11. cause i'm love sick, i'm not even ashamed

Derek had done what Lydia asked of him, accepting his role as eldest alpha and alpha of the Hale pack. He dutifully poured over the treaties as Scott gave him an abridged version of life in Beacon Hills after he left.

 

“--And my mom and Stiles' dad got married last year. Um. I'm engaged to Kira now, I dunno if I told you that or not.”

 

Derek snorted. Scott had. Three times.

 

“Let's see... Braeden and Allison are on their 'on' swing and I haven't smelled anyone on Stiles since he came back in like May, so that's about the state of relationships around here.”

 

Derek's jaw twitched. So, Stiles had spent another year in Winterhold after Derek's kidnapping. Of course he did, Derek thought miserably. Stiles probably stayed in Winterhold waiting for him, waiting for Derek to sweep him away and make good on the promises they whispered against each other's lips.

 

Scott looked at him strangely; there was probably a cocktail of conflicting emotional scents pouring off him. Derek shook his head and Scott seemed to get it.

 

“It hasn't been too bad. Thanks to Lydia, we have travel money and money in general to pursue whatever it is that we want, as long as we all come back home. Stiles took his emissary oaths, because Deaton is ready to retire. He said he will next year.”

 

Derek set the last treaty on the 'confirm' pile, which was far smaller than then 'no fucking way' pile.

 

“Check over these ones.” Derek pushed the confirm pile over to Scott who whimpered at the pile. “Are there any other packs in Beacon County?”

 

“No.” Scott answered with a pout. “Or at least nothing cohesive. Three single wolves live in Beacon Heights, two in Beacon Hollow, and I've met all of them. I don't know about Beacon Cove, but I don't think any wolves live there. The ones I know run with us sometimes. They're not pack, but they're under my protection.”

 

Derek nodded, storing away that information.

 

“You've got a few people to meet as alpha.”

 

“This treaty you have with the fae around here is pretty solid, so I'll assume you mean them.”

 

Scott preened. “It was Lydia's idea, mostly. Stiles helps them out whenever they need it, and they've gone out of their way for us. They're super nice.”

 

Derek gave a tiny smile. He remembered the clans of fae that lived in Beacon County; he remembered frolicking with them in the fields as a child, before everything went to complete shit. It would be bittersweet to see them again.

 

He glanced at Scott, who was looking down at the treaties that Derek had pushed towards him, biting his lip in concentration. He didn't quite understand why Scott didn't find himself to be a suitable alpha. It was probably because he was bitten. Derek had run into a fair few bitten garou who thought of themselves as lesser. It wasn't something he fostered in his own pack, so he forgot how rampant that line of thinking was.

 

“Alright,” Scott went on, when Derek didn't speak. “I'll drop these off with Stiles when I go into work.”

 

“Where do you work?”

 

“At the hospital. I'm a nurse.”

 

“That explains the setup in the basement.”

 

“Yup. Lydia's still in school, she transferred to Berkeley because she decided she didn't like the East Coast, but to be fair, the Rift sucks. Jackson's doing the same, but he interns at the firm he's going to work for. My eyes sort of glaze over when Danny talks about his job, but I think he technically works for Google. He has this cool friend finder app that put him on the map. Kira's the sous-chef de cuisine at The Gardens.”

 

Derek could see and almost feel how proud Scott was of his pack. Why this boy didn't think he was alpha was probably just flimsy excuses and fear for failure; Derek could try and help with that, if Scott would let him.

 

“Allison teaches self defense and archery classes. Isaac is a social worker and Braeden seems to do Braeden things. She runs the elixir side of Wolf's Bane when she's not doing Braeden things, I think? Stiles and Lydia seem to have mostly taken over the store at this  point.”

 

It was weird hearing such an abstract view of what Scott's pack had accomplished. Their roots were settled, firmly planted; they had jobs and careers and worked as such a cohesive unit. Derek could fathom taking over that. As far as Derek was concerned, Scott was their alpha.

 

Treating him like one would probably be a good step towards getting Scott to realize that as well.

 

“We're meeting with two alphas tomorrow. Treaty renewal, and I think they want to see if I'm really back too.”

 

“And you want me there?” Scott asked quietly.

 

“Look, I'll be honest with you: I've been fighting off alphas for years and posturing with the best of them, but this is Beacon Hills. It's Hale territory, so they'll be expecting more out of me than they will of you. We'll have to stick together, and if you want to get out of this with the least amount of shit on your shoulders, you'll have to defer to me.”

 

“I can do that.” Scott said instantly. “What do I need to do?”

 

“You're the established alpha here, so there's things that you'll know that I don't. You have to talk to them with confidence because this is dick waving at its very finest and Beacon County is prime real estate.”

 

“Because of the Nemeton?”

 

“That's exactly why. The draw of the Nemeton makes this a hotbed of activity and any alpha, whether they want to admit it or not, wants this area.”

 

Scott snorted. “If only they knew it was almost more trouble than it's worth. I sort of figured that Beacon Hills had some weird pull. Alphas have been trying to court Stiles and move into the area since before he took his emissary oath.”

 

“That's another thing. Who is Stiles emissary to?”

 

“He's sort of a general area emissary. He looks after the Nemeton, purifies, sits in on meetings with other alphas, handles treaties and wrangles issues like the rest of us. He kind of does it all, really. Deaton is your emissary, right?”

 

“My family's emissary, I guess. He was my mom's emissary, I don't have one.”

 

“Well, he basically trained Stiles to be his replacement during college breaks and stuff, but Stiles didn't need a ton of training since he was in Winterhold and there's emissaries up there too. It was just learning the specific stuff, like treating with werewolves and how to keep magical currents clean.”

 

“So he's unattached.” Derek said, trying to keep his voice level.

 

“I wouldn't say unattached,” Scott replied, catching Derek's eyes with a meaningful glance that Derek looked away from. “But I'm sure other alphas would.”

 

It was abundantly clear that _everyone_ knew what had gone on with him and Stiles. Or at least, Lydia and Scott did; to what extent, Derek had no idea, but they still _knew_ , and it was awkward. With Lydia, she made it fairly clear that she was mistrustful of him, which was easy. He could do something about that.

 

But with Scott, it was vague. Scott was being nice, but nice was Scott's default setting, and it didn't actually mean anything. Frankly, Scott's niceness was more of a personality trait as opposed to actually being _nice_. Derek could think of a few times that Scott's niceness only ran skin deep, and a few was enough to know that even though Derek wanted to fix things, he wouldn't ever really trust Scott. Not again.

 

There couldn't be water under a bridge that didn't exist, since it was. You know. Burned to a crisp.

 

Either way, Scott was still apparently Stiles' best friend, and his opinion of Derek could probably sway Stiles' opinion. Slightly.

 

“I don't know what I can do about that.” Derek replied, tapping his fingers against his leg. Scott made him slightly nervous. “Alphas will continue courting him until he's someone's specific emissary. It's not atypical that he's a general territory emissary, but with the amount of power under his control, others will want him. Speaking of which, if you're going to become an alpha--”

 

“I'll need someone to be my emissary.” Scott looked mournful, but playfully so. The boy still had his boyish charms, even if he was headed towards his mid-twenties. “It can't be Stiles, can it?”

 

“It can,” Derek mused. “But an emissary should match their alpha, and they should compliment each other. Deaton worked well with my mom because he was unassuming, where she was pure alpha. She rarely needed him, and he was okay with that. Not all emissaries are content to stay in the background, and their pack position is about as fluid as the alphas. They are what they need to be: they give guidance, advice, protection and an ear to their alpha. For some alphas, their emissary is their anchor. It all depends.”

 

“This is quite possibly the most I've ever heard you speak.” Scott chuckled. Years ago, that would have been a barb that would have caused Derek to close himself off. But Derek smiled wryly.

 

“Hilarious. Stiles is a big deal because he's a trained mage with an elven bloodline. Throw in the Nemeton and I'm a little surprised he hasn't gotten outright threats from other packs.”

 

“He might've, for all he tells me sometimes.”

 

“What do you mean?”

 

Scott snorted. “You know how he used to be, like, kind of rambly?”

 

“Sure. He still seems to be.”

 

“He's gotten sort of pointed.” Scott made a vague hand motion that meant nothing to Derek. “Like, he still talks an absolute fuckton, and sometimes I have no idea what he's talking about, but it's rarely for no reason. Sometimes it's a distraction, but everything is exact and precise, and for a reason. I've no idea what happened to him in Winterhold but he gets so cold sometimes. Might've been Anton, but that's what he's like now.”

 

Derek let that settle in his head, filing away 'Anton' as someone to ask Lydia about. He doubted Scott would give him a straight answer, and as long as he gave Lydia something, she'd do the same in return. Scott gathered up his things and got to his feet, giving Derek a two fingered salute.

 

“Do you need anything before I get going? I have a night shift. Not graveyard, but it'll go late tonight.”

 

“Do you have the keys to my loft? Lydia said I can have it back. And my car?”

 

“Keys to your loft and car are in Stiles' room, next to his computer monitor I think. As long as the door's open you can go in, but if he has it shut, don't even bother knocking.” Scott grabbed his hoodie off the couch and waved. “See ya, Derek.”

 

“Uh huh.”

  
  


Derek put off going into Stiles' room for about two hours. He spent that time shifted, prowling around the house's spacious backyard. He ran paces, letting his body relax and destress, weeks of tension, and extensive social activity leaving him drained and more than moody.

 

He didn't want to go in Stiles' room. He'd barely seen Stiles, but when Stiles did come back to the house, Derek's senses honed in on him; the tension in his back and shoulders, the wariness of of his lingering glances. Stiles' unique scent almost overpowered Derek's senses wherever he went, but Derek couldn't help himself. If Stiles was around, Derek was focused on him.

 

Derek darted out of the backyard and off into the woods.

 

With Stiles, he'd probably ruined everything. Their last words together were a fight, Derek's angry shouted words, and Stiles' suddenly cold dismissal. Derek wasn't lying – he was terrified and horrified by the often unchecked power that mages held.

 

But never of Stiles. Determined, mischievous, creative, brazen Stiles, who kept his house, his car, who left a space for Derek to return to.

 

A space that was supposed to be next to Stiles.

 

Derek wanted to howl, wanted to stay shifted and run until he reached the Padomaic in the East and drowned himself in it. But he knew his wolf wouldn't let him stray far from Stiles. He knew his pack wasn't be entirely honest with him. If it was up to them, he knew they would have returned to the peace and quiet of Winterhold, where there was a pack that would care for them and take them in. They were back in Beacon Hills because that's where he wanted to be.

 

Stiles' avoidance, however passive as it may have been, wasn't okay with Derek, but at least Stiles wouldn't confront him about the apparent two days Derek had spent scent marking him. Derek knew perfectly well what that sort of pointed attention meant, and he was sure that Stiles knew as well.

 

Derek was sure that Stiles knew what it meant, but he sure didn't know _why._

 

He would eventually have to compare his experience with the Thalmor with Cora's, but Derek probably knew more. They wanted to spread their influence back over Tamriel; that's what it amounted to. Altmer, at their core, were the proudest race of Mer, and next to a typical Nord, were probably the proudest race of Tamriel in general. The changes that had taken place as the eras pressed forward felt like a mockery to them, and and they hated having to pretend to be Nords and Redguards and Imperials so as not to jostle the carefully constructed Masquerade set around the magic users on the planet.

 

They wanted to use Garou to rip down that curtain. They were collecting alphas of powerful bloodlines, and Derek was a Hale. The Hale family were Imperials, noted to have strong ties to royalty in eras past, and a string of Hales were notable Harbingers before the rise of the Whitemanes.

 

Derek's memories of being in the Thalmor Embassy were hazy from the nearly constant electrical spells used on him when he wouldn't do as they demanded.

 

And their demands included bonding and mating with a young woman they deemed strong enough for his bloodline. Eventually, if his listening was as sharp as he liked to think it was, they planned to have a pack of almost superpowered Garou, mostly of the powerful ahroun moon, at their beck and call, all under a small group of alphas. Derek was to be one of those alphas.

 

But he resisted as much as he could, and daily he felt the pain of his refusal.

 

He kept his mind on his pack. He let the pull of their bond grow lax, so they wouldn't feel even faintly what he was feeling, but he drew on their strength, and the resolve they had looking for him.

 

He also thought of Stiles. Each time the Thalmor would bring in the woman they insisted would make him a good mate, he thought of Stiles. Stiles' magic filled eyes, his shock of hair, the smell of ozone all over him and his clothes.

 

It was probably the last thing he thought about every time he closed his eyes.

 

Which is probably why he ended up in Beacon Hills again. Seeking out the one his wolf picked.

 

Derek wanted to drown in Stiles; he wanted to drag him back to his room and make it their den. Stiles' room smelt of magic and herbs and flowers and crackling ozone; the scent of magic and Stiles and his pack had seeped into the fabric of everything he owned. He wanted to mix their scents and have that sink into their clothes, their shared bed sheets, _their_ scent throughout _their_ house. He wanted to bite the skin behind Stiles' ear, keep a hand on the small of his back the way Stiles likes, and make him feel the same way Derek did: like the ground was crumbling into nothing below him.

 

Gods, he _wanted_.

 

The property where his family's home once stood smelt like nothing. Dirt, Derek guessed as he padded toward it. He doesn't spare any thought wondering how he got there – he encouraged himself to follow his wolf's instincts. It allowed him much greater control.

 

He was home, in a way.

 

Derek wandered over to where there was freshly turned dirt, where various plants had sprung up, large and healthy. It seemed like someone's garden, and he assumed that someone was either Stiles or Braeden. His eyes skimmed over what used to be the land the charred husk of his family home once stood, quietly scenting the air.

 

“Derek?”

 

Derek sat back on his haunches as Cora came into view, with Lydia and Jackson in step beside her. She beckoned him closer, but Derek wuffed in response. She glanced at her brother a furrowed brow, one that reminded Derek of their mother.

 

“Is that Derek?” Lydia asked as they came closer. She was wearing what could be constituted as sensible shoes for her –a pair of red Doc Martins. Derek snorted in both amusement and as an answer.

 

“My brother is the creeper wolf over there, yeah.” Cora replied. Derek didn't disagree, so he laid down.

 

“Derek, you listen up too, then.” Lydia said, waving at him. “Now, this property has more or less has been turned into a garden for the store's use. It's still under Derek's name, and we bought up some of the surrounding area as well – Stiles' call of course. It's not much of an investment unless we do something with it. Fresh ingredients are fine, but we get enough shipment that it's mostly just extra work.”

 

“What do you suggest?” Cora asked, looking over the flourishing garden.

 

“A house.” Jackson interrupted. “What you should do is have a house built. We all have homes and apartments, but you don't.”

 

Derek growled and Jackson held his hands up, eyes narrowed. “I'm just saying. You have the room, you have the money, why not make somewhere to call your own that isn't a dusty loft? It smells like moth balls in there.”

 

True as it may be, Derek didn't think being callous right where his home was _supposed_ to be right.

 

The garden, though. That was alright.

 

Cora didn't seem all that phased by Jackson's words, but she didn't look like she was paying attention to Jackson either. It was probably for the best. Jackson didn't know anything about Cora's hair trigger of a temper and he wouldn't like to find out either.

 

“There's another plot of land to the east,” Lydia went on, pointing. “I mean, it's October, but if you decide to go ahead with it, the ground can be broken in for foundation pretty quickly.”

 

“It's not an awful idea,” Cora replied, casting a glance in Derek's direction.

 

He would let her make that call in the end, but he figured discussing it as a pack would be the best option. A lot of the time with decisions like this, he tended not to care one way or another, and left things like that to Cora. He wasn't sure if Boyd and Erica would want to be nearby or not, what with the twins on the way, but Derek liked the idea of having a large house for the pack to call home, even if they lived elsewhere.

 

The look in Cora's eyes said she knew exactly what he was thinking.

 

Later, when Cora propped her feet up on Derek's dashboard, looking like she didn't have a care in the world, Derek brought up the subject. Erica and Boyd were in the backseat, surrounded by their meager belongings. They were on their way to the building that Derek apparently still owned; Lydia said that it was usually rented out to students, sans Derek's loft, which was probably dusty as all get out.

 

Which wasn't bad. They'd slept in worse places.

 

“How would you two feel about Hale House being rebuilt?”

 

“Wouldn't your opinion matter more than ours?” Boyd drawled, and it was a very specific drawl, a drawl that meant he was trying not to laugh.

 

“Wouldn't ask if I didn't care.”

 

“I wouldn't mind a room, if you're offering.” Erica mused, sounding thoughtful. “But I actually want to hold my kids, so just a room with cribs in it or something.”

 

“Not even sure what that's supposed to mean,” Derek muttered, glancing at his rearview mirror.

 

“It means I can tell you'll be a baby hog.” Erica brought her foot up to press against the back of Derek's seat. “So, if you're asking, a room for us will be fine, thanks with no angst.”

 

Derek puffed a sigh as Cora snickered under her breath.

 

“I wasn't going to angst over it.” he groused.

 

“What kind of alpha lies to his betas?” Boyd said, sounding wounded.

 

“Aw, I think he's getting broody.” Erica was absolutely delighted, and Derek was already exhausted. “Do you want rugrats too? I could see you as a big, gruff stay at home dad with a bushy beard and who wears plaid all the fuckin' time and squeezes his own almond milk. You'd have a little hammock to put 'em in, and you'd make organic purees for your teething toddler.”

 

“That's oddly specific.” Boyd sounded pained.

 

“Derek is an oddly specific person.”

 

“Are we there yet?” Cora moaned.


	12. you're something i cannot miss

Scott's pack was milling around the pack house restlessly, obviously in tune with Scott's anxious mood. Derek, however, was calm, looking over some of the general notes Lydia had given him.

 

“Hey, Jackson,” Derek intoned, looking over the page of who was in who's pack. Jackson's name was neatly printed and signed under the Hale pack along with Boyd, Cora and Erica. On Scott's side, there was Isaac, Danny, Kira, and Lydia, and Braeden had signed as Scott's emissary. Allison was also on Scott's side, to Derek's confusion.

 

That probably wouldn't go over well, but before he could really talk to Scott about that, Jackson sauntered over and plopped down next to him.

 

“So you're in my pack?” Derek said with no inflection. He was just making sure he had things correct.

 

“Yeah.” Jackson said, sounding confident. “You haven't been around, but I smell like Cora and I did personally ask for you for the bite.”

 

Which was true. Jackson _did_ ask for the bite, everything that happened afterward notwithstanding. But that felt like a lifetime ago to Derek, who barely knew the adult sitting next to him. His wolf, however, grumbled contentedly over Jackson's choice, pleased that the beta decided to return to his side.

 

“Plus, I never really left your pack.” Jackson tried again, seeing as Derek hadn’t answered. “Did you think I would let McCall be my alpha? Fuck no.”

 

And to Scott's credit, he didn’t respond to Jackson's jab, being that his face was pressed into Kira's chest while she stroked his head.

 

“Alright.” Derek could work with that, assuming Jackson could integrate into the pack. “If you can listen to Cora and not piss off Erica or give Boyd a headache, then alright, sure.”

 

Jackson glanced at Cora, who started back at him evenly.

 

“Won't be an issue.” Jackson agreed and moved to sit next to Cora who tugged him close. Scott finally got to his feet and walked over to where Derek was sitting, and they both waited for the rest of their packs to file into the den.

 

“So what's going to be happening today is a meeting with us and Alpha Whitemane and Alpha Hunt.” Derek began.

 

“We have a non-aggression pact in place with them, and it's due to be renewed this year, but they want to discuss it further.” Scott went on. “Probably because Derek is back.”

 

“It is.” Stiles put in. “We're a smaller pack, even together, and we have a lot of territory, a lot of sway on the West Coast and a lot of power to back it up.”

 

“Whitemane is an old, _old_ pack.” Derek continued. “Traditionalists, if I remember them correctly. They absolutely want _something,_  and even though I get on well enough with Whitemane, Hunt is the only trustworthy one between the two of them.”

 

“They’ll be here in about an hour; feel free to lurk around the house if you want, or you can go and do your own thing,” Stiles finished up. “This is a display of power at its core. Don't forget it.”

 

There were murmurs of agreement as the pack went back to milling around.

 

Alphas Whitemane and Hunt appeared late, with their emissary in tow.

 

Derek was already irritated by the time they decided to show up, Scott had worked himself into an anxious mess, and Stiles was... well. Derek knew that Stiles had some Altmer features; the most pronounced being his ears, but otherwise else, he just looked like Stiles. But during the wait, Lydia had sat Stiles down at the kitchen table and spread out a variety of brushes, palettes, and bottles. She brushed a cool gold over his cheekbones, added eyeliner and highlighted little things along his face that wouldn't make Derek think _High Elf_ ; but once highlighted, Stiles looked regal, like a highborn Altmer would. His eyes glowed with power and magic, his usual brown lightened to a startling amber. Derek swallowed sharply when he got a good look at him.

 

“We're grateful you designed to meet with us, Alpha Hale,” the Whitemane emissary started, tilting her head in greeting. “Emissary Stilinski.”

 

Stiles' arms had been folded since the door was opened and he didn't seem inclined to make any sort of polite motions towards the older woman. “Emissary Rosenbark. Pleasure, as always.”

 

Derek gave the three a glance over as Scott welcomed them into the house – Alpha Aela Hunt was a beautiful as Derek remembered her being; wild red hair that was wind tousled without a care, braids interwoven throughout. Her eyes were green and playful and Derek had a hundred fond memories of running through the woods with Aela, who was always somewhat faster than him. He could see himself treating with her without any issues.

 

Alpha Kodlak Whitemane was another garou that Derek remembered from his youth; he was the alpha who controlled the neighboring Whiterun County. The man had aged since Derek had seen him last – silver had taken over his hair, and he had grown it out long and tied it back with a ribbon. Between them was Fionna Rosenbark, who looked Breton typical – dark eyes, hair that had faded from brown to white and slightly pointed ears.

 

She smelled a little upset to Derek's nose, but Stiles did as well.

 

“You may not be aware of this, but Alpha McCall has chosen to accept the roll as Alpha of Beacon Hills,” Stiles began as the seven sat down around the large kitchen table. Braeden sat beside Scott on his left side, Derek sat to his right, and Stiles sat to Derek's right side.

 

“And Alpha Hale?” Fionna inquired.

 

“Presides over Beacon County and the Hale territory in general.” Stiles replied smoothly.

 

Derek glanced at Stiles, who was focused on Fionna. There was probably a story there, and Derek wasn't sure he wanted to know.

 

“I take that we'll be speaking to Derek, then?” Kodlak asked, catching Derek's attention. “You look well, m'boy.”

 

“You as well,” Derek replied. “And while Scott is still finding his way as an alpha, you'll be treating with both of us.”

 

“Wonderful!” Aela looked pleased by this, and Scott gave her a small, shy smile. “Let us continue, then.”

 

“Alright,” Stiles set their current treaty in front of Aela, who flipped through it. “We're convening for the re-establishment of our non-aggression treaty.”

 

“You've been nothing but gracious and kind to us, Stiles, so we were hoping to renegotiate to create an alignment treaty.”

 

“The Hale pack is old blood,” Kodlak went on. “And the territory has been in flux since Talia's murder, may the Gods preserve her.”

 

“I agree,” Derek rumbled, feeling chastised by Kodlak's otherwise mild words. “And I believe Scott and I can manage the territory well.”

 

“Mm, yes, Alpha McCall has shown his worth, hasn't he?” Fionna cast a critical gaze towards Scott, who jerked in his seat. “Spent years cavorting with an Argent and still persists in including her in pack relations. How very trustworthy.”

 

“That's not entirely fair --” Scott started, but Stiles held up an hand.

 

“Madam Emissary, if you have something you just _have_ to say, by all means, the floor is yours.”

 

Fionna's jaw twitched slightly, and Derek's eyes flicked back and forth between the two of them. He didn't dare assume he knew what was going on, and he didn't want to get in between two magic users. Fionna did have a point, as Derek had a few reservations about Allison signing to be part of Scott's pack, but it wasn't _his_ pack, so he didn't feel the need to get involved in it.

 

He did, however, warn Scott about posturing. He would have to stick up for himself, because if Derek bailed him out, it would make Scott _and_ his pack look weak. They couldn't afford that.

 

“Why is there an assassin here?” Fionna snapped.

 

“She's my emissary to be.” Scott responded quietly.

 

“Braeden Aldwr.” Braeden inclined her head as Fionna did when she had walked into the house.

 

“You're taking over for Deaton, then?”

 

“In a matter of speaking. He's doing my training, but Alan was Talia Hale's emissary, not Scott's.”

 

Kodlak and Aela seemed strangely quiet from what Derek remembered them as. He knew them both well enough – Aela was his age and they were friends as children, and Kodlak was older than his mother. He took on a grandfatherly role when Derek and his siblings visited, happily passing on his knowledge to Laura while he and Cora tumbled around with the Whitemane cubs.

 

Perhaps it wasn't so clear to Scott, who kept shooting panicked glances in Derek's direction, but today's round of posturing appeared to be a grudge match between emissaries. Derek doubted Kodlak would step in unless spells were being flung.

 

“How very nice. The McCall pup who allowed Argents to escape to the Rift takes on an emissary who beds the same Argent he once did.” Fionna turned her attention back to Stiles, who wore an Altmer's mask of regal, frigid calm. “Stiles, I know we've had our differences, but you cannot expect me to take this seriously.”

 

Stiles looked as though he wanted to say something, but it passed. He simply glanced at Braeden and Scott, who looked shocked and quietly furious, in that order.

 

Derek took Stiles' lead and remained quiet himself; Stiles, while silent, was correct. Derek had been up against plenty of alphas that knew him and his family, and questioned everything he did. He had to defend himself, either by throwing himself and his claws directly at them, or by simply soothing their issues with him. Admittedly, Scott didn't _want_ to be an alpha, but he had bitten Danny. The fact that he hadn't taken responsibility for that wouldn't go unnoted.

 

'I'll say something if he really needs it,' Derek decided to himself, leaning away from the table.

 

“What exactly do you want me to say here?” Scott asked, a steely look in his eyes. “Because all I'm hearing from you is that you just want a non-aggression pact because there's something more interesting on Netflix.”

 

Fionna wouldn't be cowed easily, however, and flippant comments just tended to piss her off. It was no wonder she and Stiles seemed to dislike each other.

 

“This is your first sit in, boy, so I'll let your disrespect slide this time.”

 

“This isn't my first sit in, and you know that!” Scott snapped out. “Either make a point about the Argents, or I'll leave you to talk to Braeden about it.”

 

“Hiding behind the Dark Brotherhood, pup?” Fionna sneered. Derek had always found it interesting how easily emissaries took on the traits of their packs. Rosenbark was a traditionalist, as proven by this conversation, and very clearly belonged with Pack Whitemane. Stiles, and apparently Braeden, were clearly more modern types, and they would probably always clash in some matter or another. Rosenbark reflected her alpha, while Stiles and Braeden complemented theirs.

 

Stiles hadn't come out and said he was Derek's emissary, but Scott had obviously gone with Braeden and not Stiles for a reason. Their Winterhold discussion of their life once Stiles graduated notwithstanding, Stiles had decided what he wanted and sat beside Derek and added yet another point of discussion for the two of them, if they _ever_ got time alone.

 

“Trying to discredit Scott won't get you what you want, and it's in poor taste.” Derek said when Scott clearly wasn't going to respond well. “Kodlak, what exactly are we here for?”

 

“We had heard of your return some time ago.” Kodlak started, bringing himself to his full height in his chair.  “And we sent word for a meeting. Why did it take so long to meet?”

 

“I wasn't in any state to meet with anyone.” Derek replied honestly. “A run in with the Thalmor left me in a state.”

 

Aela made a sympathetic noise. “Derek, you must join me on a run with my new betas. I have missed you terribly.”

 

Kodlak nodded. “Now, in honor of your mother, and due to Stiles' handling of the territory, the Hale territory has remained protected in times of chaos.”

 

Stiles' scent went sharp and bitter. Derek looked at him, but Stiles keep looking ahead.

 

“We haven't asked anything in return.”

 

“But wait, you said it was in honor of Derek's mother.” Scott put in. “That would mean it was out of the goodness of your hearts and respect for her, right?”

 

“You would think that.” Fionna rolled her eyes and Stiles bristled. “We protected this territory from excessive bloodshed by turning away those who wanted to prey on a budding pack.”

 

“All of which we expressed our endless thanks for,” Scott continued, his voice taking on an edge of confusion. “In fact, I'd welcome an alliance between the packs...”

 

Aela spoke up. “I do not mean offense Scott, as I was a young alpha once myself, but you will only be signing this treaty as an alpha under Derek. He's older, and this is his family's territory. Not to slight you of course. I used to sign with Kodlak until I gained more leverage and a bigger pack.”

 

Scott frowned.

 

“I feel that Derek saying that Scott is alpha of Beacon Hills should be enough,” Braeden brought up. “Because that would put the Nemeton under his jurisdiction, particularly with the sacrifice he, Stiles and Ms. Argent made some years ago.”

 

Out of the corner of his eye, Derek could see Stiles smile to himself. Braeden was sharp and caught on quickly, he could clearly see that. She would make a good match for Scott's sweet earnestness.

 

“The Nemeton doesn't _belong_ to anyone.” Fionna's tone was icy cold, as was the glare she levered at Braeden, who instead looked to Scott. It was then Stiles decided to join the conversation again, stretching his arms high over his head before settling laced fingers on the table.

 

“Alright, cards on the table, because I'm tired of this.” Stiles jerked his chin at Kodlak. “Alpha Whitemane, the alliance with Derek's pack would gain you more notoriety for being friendly with the now enigmatic alpha of the Hale pack. My services would also be at your disposal, though they will be limited. Same for you, Aela.”

 

“I merely wish to ally with an old friend and bond with a new alpha.” Aela smile was open and honest, and Stiles smiled back at her. Derek's memories of the reckless and wild ahron werewolf served him well – Aela had always been honest to a fault.

 

“Now that our half is out of the way, we're going to pretend that I don't know you wish to expand your pack's territory, Whitemane, and I'm going to ignore that load of it about protecting this territory. That doesn't mean a fucking thing if you can't be bothered to protect the pack in it, so let's try this again. What can you offer us?”

 

“Stiles, I know you've been feeling particularly... shall we say feisty? Since you settled back here. And ran the Silver Hand out of town.” Fionna's gaze sharpened, and Stiles merely raised an eyebrow. “But you'll watch your tone us, boy.”

 

Stiles shrugged. “Fine. But, consider this the next time you want to swing your dicks around with me, I'm not an idiot, as much as you may want to think I am, Madam Emissary. I know what you're trying to do, I know exactly what you want.”

 

“Oh?”

 

“'The Nemeton doesn't belong to anyone?'” Stiles snorted, leaning back in his chair until two legs came up. “Spare me the thought that you think the Nemeton is anything more than a power source you can take to get one over on me. I don't need the Nemeton, but you can have it and its power over my dead corpse.”

 

Fionna grit her teeth. “Fried, charred or frostbitten?”

 

“Oh fuck off with that, you rotten, old--”

 

“That's enough.” Derek interrupted. Fionna shot a furious glare at him and Stiles, but said no more. Stiles didn't look any happier, his eyes glowing with barely restrained power.

 

“Kodlak, as much as I am – _we_ are – deeply thankful for any assistance you have given Scott's pack over the years, I'm going to take Stiles' opinion into account here, and discuss it further before we treat again.”

 

“He's unattached.” Fionna scoffed. “You might think it wise to bow when one of the Mer say so, but I will not.”

 

“No one is asking you to.” Scott said, finally breaking his silence. “Look, as much as I would like this alliance to work, it's obviously not going to.”

 

“Perhaps when the McCall pack becomes a proper, territory-owning pack, gains a worthwhile emissary, and gets rid of those those unsightly Argents.” Fionna rested her chin on folded hands. “Derek, you might want to get yourself an emissary as well.”

 

“Enough, Fionna.” Kodlak's voice had a note of finality to it, and Fianna's jaw clicked shut. “Derek, what say you?”

 

“I believe our needs as alphas do not fit together currently,” Derek replied slowly, nodding towards Stiles. “I don't know enough to sign this treaty with soundness of mind.”

 

“And he _has_ an emissary.” Stiles lifted his chin.

 

“A mer? With the Hales?” Fionna looked more offended than Derek thought she had any right to be, and last time he checked, Stiles was far more Breton than Mer, but before he could voice that, Stiles spoke back up.

 

“I'm not sitting next to him because we're hot together.” Stiles fumed. “Deaton may be training Braeden, but I am the Hale's emissary.”

  


Derek and Aela, alike in more ways that Derek wanted to examine, started mapping out the hopeful points of an alignment between their packs, and Scott happily added in information about Beacon Hills and the other wolves in the area when he needed to. They resigned the non-aggression treaty with Kodlak as well, Kodlak's age and wisdom letting him look past the clusterfuck that was that particular meetup.

 

Mere moments after the alphas and their emissary pulled away, Stiles turned to Scott, half a frown on his face.

 

“What?” Scott asked, his smile falling from his face.

 

“We have so much work to do before really presenting you as an alpha,” Stiles said, with no particular inflection in his voice. “Braeden really is a perfect match for you, though.”

 

“Is that a compliment towards her or yourself?” Scott asked, turning on his heel and headed towards the kitchen.

 

“Braeden, mostly.”

 

Derek winced. So Stiles was less than impressed with Scott's showing today. Derek didn't think he did too bad; he was new at it, and as far as he could see, Stiles and Braeden and possibly Lydia did most of the talking when it came to pack ties. All things considered, it went alright, Scott just had to get used to sticking up for himself instead of deflecting.

 

“Look, no one got mauled, so I'm gonna go with everything went well. It's not like there's a book on how to be an alpha. Fionna's as charming as ever and--”

 

“It's never been directed at you, I know.” Stiles sniffed, much like a wolf would when they'd scent a room for high emotions. “I get it, but dude, you can't just shut down like that, and you can't just think I'm going to bail you out, or get your foot out of your mouth every time now. I'm not always going to be there.”

 

“I know that.” Scott replied sourly. “But way to just throw me to the wolves there.”

 

“Scott, seriously?” Braeden was typing away on her phone, sitting on the other side of the couch from Derek. There were two other heartbeats in the house, one of which he assumed was Kira, and the other he had no idea. Cora, maybe. He'd have to listen closer.

 

“You told Fionna that it wasn't your first sit in, so show some spine.”

 

“ _Enserio_? I can't be expected to know everything!”

 

“No one expects you to!” Braeden snapped back, looking up at him, baring her teeth. Derek raised his brows, and Stiles let out a tired sigh. “The only thing I expect or anyone expects is for you to act like you know what you're doing, even if you don't. And you do! You live here! Stiles shouldn't have to bail you out because someone didn't fall for your puppy eyes, like _fuck_.”

 

“What, so I was just supposed to instantly know which power play they were going for there? Aela was fine, Kodlak looked at me like he was disappointed and it was Fionna who was on my case, and about Allison! Of course I got upset. Don't pretend you weren't, I could smell it on you. _Que quieres de mí_ , huh? To be a mindreader?”

 

Derek heaved a sigh himself as the two started bickering, but made no motion to stop them. It was a good thing, after all; no emissary should be afraid to talk to their alpha, and no alpha should power trip so hard that their emissary _can't_ talk to them. Bickering or not, at least they were talking.

 

“Well, at least they're talking.” Stiles said quietly, as he walked over to where Derek was sitting. Braeden had already gotten up, and gotten right into Scott's face, a finger prodding him in the chest.

 

“Mm, they'll be alright, they just have to get it together.”

 

“Mhm.”

 

With Scott and Braeden bickering in the background, the silence between the two of them wasn't terribly awkward, but it was the first time they'd honestly had a conversation in well over a year now. Their last shouting match was replaying in Derek's mind; the angry insults, the stony silence, Stiles' cold eyes and expression.

 

“You're thinking about the last time we had sex, aren't you?” Stiles said suddenly, giving Derek a brief jolt.

 

“Wait, what?” Derek replied smartly.

 

“You. You're being quiet because you're thinking about the last time we fucked because I'm sitting next to you.”

 

Derek waited until Stiles took a sip from his water bottle to reply. “No, the time before was way better. You came on your face.”

 

Stiles sputtered, coughing slightly as Derek leaned back into the couch. He remembered that instance _well_. He had Stiles' legs resting in the crook of his arms, but they were close to touching his cheek. The way Stiles had moaned _more_ was enough to almost make him flush down to his chest even now. They had gone on for so long, by the time Derek let Stiles come, he had come like a bottle cork popping.

 

“So, you're the Hale emissary, huh?”

 

“Are you surprised?” Stiles chuckled mirthlessly, wiping his mouth. “I promised I'd be that for you. Me and you, remember?”

 

“I do,” Derek answered, swallowing before speaking again. “I just didn't think you'd want to after--”

 

“Don't say anything you don't actually want to say, Derek.” Stiles interrupted, drying his hands on his pants. “Glad to see you're still as selfless as ever, but I _want_ to do this. I'm already doing it. Don't take it away from me because we broke up.”

 

Derek startled. “Is that what you think happened with us?”

 

Stiles didn't answer, but his face gave Derek a thousand ideas as to what he was thinking.

 

“I swear I was going to apologize,” Derek rushed out, taking Stiles' silence as an upcoming dismissal so he could take care of Braeden and Scott, but Derek hadn't spoken to him directly in _so long_. “I was. I was going to bring flowers and take you out to breakfast after your first class because you don't eat in the morning. I was by the shore getting nirnroot for the flowers when I was abducted.”

 

“The Thalmor,” Stiles hissed, tensing. “You have to tell me about that. That's way too fucked for you not to say anything about it--”

 

“We can talk about it later, this is about you and me.”

 

“Derek...” Stiles was frowning, but Derek pushed on because if Stiles started, Derek would do whatever he wanted.

 

“No, wait, let me finish. I didn't want to break up. I never wanted to break up. I wanted to be at your graduation, I wanted to take you back here, and I wanted this. I wanted us.”

 

Stiles' eyes were wide, brown-gold that drove Derek insane, and soft pink lips that he knew kissed with a passion that made Derek _want to keep going._

 

Derek leaned forward, giving Stiles a chance to get up and walk away, and when he didn't, Derek slid his hand up Stiles' thigh, wrapping his arm around Stiles' hips and pulled him close.

 

When they kissed, it was like they hadn't been apart at all; Derek's tongue pressed for entrance and Stiles let him, soft as ever. Stiles kissed like he had something to say, but it was stuck in his tongue, which he was currently pressing into Derek's mouth.

 

He pulled back, leaving Derek's mouth hungry, and Derek opened his eyes slowly to take in the dazed look he put on Stiles face.  Stiles pressed his head against Derek's, one hand coming up to cup the back of Derek's neck.

 

“We have to talk. And we have to start over.”

 

Derek nodded slowly.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> that's a wrap on _book one_. there was a lot of plotlines that i've mentioned to be started, what with lady nocternal's skeleton key, peter escaping the dawnguard, nick's sister wanting to meet derek, the mysterious anton knox, and taking care of the thalmor. and that, of course, isn't even counting the prophecy spoken of by mercer, or the crimson nirnroot.
> 
> thank yous! thank you to my best friendo delta cephei for cheering me on and supporting me through this entire ordeal -- from this being pack bonding fic, to a 50k memory loss fic, to this behemoth of a story and then turning around and _editing_ it. you're a champ and i love you! thank you to garvey for discussing the finer points of elder scrolls and helping me make up my own elder scrolls lore mess while screaming "that doesn't make sense!!" like i don't know that already. thanks to xordanus for sitting with me and roasting all of teen wolf season one; you're a vip for watching the whole goddamn thing with me. thanks(?) to genericgirlname for somehow getting me to read teen wolf fic in the first damn place. thank you to my wonderful artist, sunkentowers, for bouncing off head canons with me and holding my hand through the final parts of the fic and running characterization checks. you're the best and i'm glad to have met you.
> 
> and thank you to everyone that read and wants to continue reading. i promise things will be far more interesting from here on out -- hopefully you didn't think it would be that easy to get stiles and derek together again, did you?
> 
> so yeah. book one is done, and i'm ten k into the next book, so see you soon!


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